My Great Class

Yesterday was the first day of my Painting 1 class at the University of Alberta Extension. I am working towards my Fine Arts Certificate.

I found the classroom in this mammoth building that used to be The Bay department store many moons ago. As it goes in life, these old buildings get replaced by newer ones. FORTUNATELY, this building was not demolished (I am sure it is a historical site) and was renovated to provide a new space for the Extension department for the University of Alberta. (I will take a picture of it soon and post it.) Anyway, I found the classroom and saw that the teacher was young and vibrant. So far so good! It took a little while to get the class going and then we were all asked to tell everyone our names, a bit of history about ourselves, and which artists we like the best. It was a very interesting session and we have a wide variety of people there. Two men are included amongst the 11 women.

As it goes with these things, the first hour was basically finding out what we will be doing during the 10 weeks (one class per week) of our course. The second hour was looking at slides and getting refreshed on certain facts about colour, etc., and the third hour was doing a bit of painting. It will be mostly all painting from now on, so I am very much looking forward to that. I had to tell my teacher, though, that I will have to miss the October 4th class as I will be in the Run For The Cure that is taking place at exactly the same time! That is so very unfortunate...but I made a commitment to do the run, and I can't back out now. I have, after all, many sponsors that I don't want to let down!

So, not too much to report for the first class, other than there is a wide diversity of people and what looks to be a very nice teacher. Will post again soon as I continue on this week with homework, etc.

Back to work

Well, summer is over and it's time to get back to work. I must admit, I thought I would be on this blog far more than I have been. I intend to start back at it now and with my new "re-start" into my University of Alberta Fine Arts Certificate course starting back up on Sunday, I will be much more motivated to share my journey. My first 'back to it' class is Painting 1. Because I have never had any formal training in painting, I am very much looking forward to this. I stopped taking these classes a couple of years ago due to health issues, but I feel now like I can get back to it...the timing seems right to me. So, onward and upward as they say....