LIVE & LIVE STREAM

Your guild, club or group of artist friends will benefit from my online live-steaming lectures and workshops (1 hour up to 2 days). And, you’ll get quality instruction and entertaining presentations without having the expense of teacher travel or lodging. Each of the topics below is ready to be booked by your guild or small group of artists.

TOPICS: LECTURES and WORKSHOPS

Susie Monday. Art. Ideas

My art work and teaching are informed by a life long journey exploring, understanding and pushing into the creative process. Join me for an hour exploring the path I’ve taken for that journey through themes, technology, skills and curiosity while you reflect upon your own journey. Includes a brief hands on drawing experience that helps you explore your own path. Depending on the size of group, we will share these creativity maps. Supplies are simple and a list will be provided before the lecture. Live-stream lecture with recorded slide show shared via Zoom. Live Q & A.

Digital Beyond Photos

Many quilters have seen the amazing digital reproductions of photos created by art quilters around the world. But with the use of an iPad, computer or other tablet (even a phone) quilt artists can move beyond photographic reproduction into artistic filters, drawing and painting and amazing patterns.

Lectures

The Digital Beyond Photos one-hour lecture includes a live introduction, a 30 minute video/slide show of examples and apps, and a 20 minute live demonstration of apps shared from my iPad screen, followed by 10 minutes or so of Q&A. Fee for lecture in 2022 is $200 (small guilds can request a discount).

Workshops

Three- to four-hour workshops include live instruction, Q&A, a Zoom share and discussion of exercises, experiments and examples. PDF copies of tutorials and links to videos are included for participants. Planning can include some customization of the content, with a focus on drawing and painting, photo editing and special effects apps, pattern apps, using Spoonflower etc. Fee for a 3-4 hour workshop for up to 25 participants is $500 (lecture included if not viewed in a guild meeting before workshop).

Longer (1-2 day workshops) include a project using the images that participants make, sent to Susie for mail delivery later, topics of choice, a demo of working with Spoonflower, and a video demo showing how I construct a fused raw-edge collage appliqué art quilt using an inkjet printed image and how to mount a small quilt on a canvas frame. Fee for a full day workshop (6 hours) is $800 per day.

Creativity: Our DNA, Dangerous Myths, and Finding your Voice

What does it take to discover your unique visual style and voice in your work? Are you ready to move beyond other people’s patterns, from traditional work into the world of art quilting? This lecture will outline the steps that will help you get started with quickie hands-on writing and sketching assignments as we go through the process of taking your imagination, personal history and skills into a visual world that only you can create. Even if art quilts are not genre you are interested in pursuing, you’ll understand more about the processes that all artists, no matter the genre, use to find their unique expressions.

Lecture

My Creativity one-hour lecture includes a live introduction, a 45 minute narrated video/slide show, followed by 10 minutes or so of Q&A. Fee for lecture in 2022 is $200 (small guilds can request a discount).

Workshops

Three- to four-hour workshops include live instruction, Q&A, a Zoom share and discussion of exercises, experiments and examples. PDF copies of tutorials and links to videos are included for participants. The workshop includes a focus on the creative process, the Sensory Alphabet and a self-assessment of each artist’s creative process. A supply list will be provided for at-home or guild workshop space activities. Fee is $500 for up to 20 artists.

A full day workshop with expanded activities (6-7 hours) is $800 per day.

The Sensory Alphabet

This is the “alphabet” I use for idea generation, critique and to organize my explorations of the world: line, color, shape, movement, texture, rhythm, space, light, sound. Each of these (related but not equal to the design tools we study in art classes) is a way to analyze and generate ideas for original work, a path for understanding one’s unique perceptions and a tool for reaching into new ways to working.

Lecture

This one-hour lecture includes a live-stream lecture with slides and video, a few short exercises to get you started on the path, followed by 10 minutes or so of Q&A.

Workshops

Three- to four-hour workshops include live instruction, Q&A, a Zoom share and discussion of exercises, experiments and examples. PDF copies of tutorials and links to videos are included for participants. The workshop includes exercises for each of the Sensory Alphabet elements. A supply list will be provided for at-home or guild workshop space activities. Fee is $500 for up to 20 artists.

A full day workshop with expanded activities (6-7 hours) is $800 per day.

Writing and Creating Artist Videos

This is an online video writing and production workshop for artists working in any visual medium or genre. Use your laptop, smartphone or tablet to plan, write and produce compelling and intriguing short videos using Adobe Spark and YouTube for use on social media, at exhibits and in your own workshops. The process of producing a visual multimedia artist statement will help you focus and define your creative work and purpose, and enhance your communication to collectors, students and your art audience. YOu’ll learn some easy tools for creating your own videos. This workshop is co-facilitated by retired communications professor and documentary video producer Dr. Linda Cuellar, and Susie Monday, artist and teacher.

With Dr. Linda Cuellar, retired mass communications professor, producer, videographer, author.

Workshop

Six-hour workshop includes live instruction, Q&A, working with a partner (either together or via Zoom) a Zoom share and discussion of exercises, experiments and examples. PDF copies of tutorials and links to videos are included for participants. A supply list will be provided for at-home or guild workshop space activities. Participants will need a smart phone, a computer to use for demos and some artwork samples to share with others. Lots of unperson coaching, critique session and editing help. Fee is $600 for up to 10 artists.

Susie Monday. Art. Ideas

My art work and teaching are informed by a life long journey exploring, understanding and pushing into the creative process. Join me for an hour exploring the path I’ve taken for that journey through themes, technology, skills and curiosity while you reflect upon your own journey. Includes a brief hands on drawing experience that helps you explore your own path. Depending on the size of group, we will share these creativity maps via Zoom. Supplies are simple and a list will be provided before the lecture. Live-stream lecture with recorded slide show shared via Zoom.

Lecture

This one-hour lecture includes a live-stream lecture with slides and video, a few short exercises to get you started on the path, followed by 10 minutes or so of Q&A.

From Digital Design to Print-at-Home and Print-on-Demand

You CAN design your own fabric! You’ve heard about Spoonflower and other companies that print your designs, you have an inkjet printer (or you want to know which one to buy for printing on fabric). But if you don’t get help with set-up your results may not be what you expected. This 3-4-hour workshop takes you hands-on with your computer or iPad from paintings and drawings, collages and photograph/s to both commercially printed and home-printed fabric to use in your quilts. You’ll go live with Susie as she takes you through the steps for simple edits, easy to use filters to make them really interesting, and then the technical skills needed for inkjet printing at home, and uploading to print-on-demand sites that will print your image for yardage. You will learn to size images correctly, how to make repeats, and a quick intro to using the Spoonflower site. You will set up a Spoonflower account and upload a sample photo or image (no need to order, just for practice.) Downloadable PDF tutorials available to participants after the workshop. Workshop 3 hours, $400.

Workshops

Three- to four-hour workshop includes live instruction, Q&A, a Zoom share and discussion of exercises, experiments and examples. PDF copies of tutorials and links to videos are included for participants. iPad or laptop or Windows tablet required. A supply list will be provided for at-home or guild workshop space activities. Fee is $500 for up to 20 artists.

Text on Textiles

This lecture and workshop takes participants through both digital and surface design techniques to use for designing original quilts and fabric using text, letter forms and quotations.

Lecture

The one-hour lecture shares examples and inspiration for using text and letter forms in your art quilts includes a live-stream lecture with slides and video, followed by 10 minutes or so of Q&A.

Workshops

Live demos and recorded videos in this workshop will cover some fun techniques for adding words to your images, both digitally and” in real life.” Each participant will make and share a magazine collage and smartphone photos with filters that open up a world of possibilities for your textile art. We will also do some simple cut-and-paste letter form experiments and hand-printed fabric. Downloadable PDFs for participants after the workshop.

Three- to four-hour workshops include live instruction, Q&A, a Zoom share and discussion of exercises, experiments and examples. PDF copies of tutorials and links to videos are included for participants. A supply list will be provided for at-home or guild workshop space activities. Fee is $500 for up to 20 artists.

A full day workshop with expanded activities (6-7 hours) is $800 per day.

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WHAT PARTICIPANTS SAY ABOUT SUSIE’S CLASSES & WORKSHOPS:

"It was Extraordinary!  Big food for the soul.   Lots of exciting art making.   

"We voiced (our art making intentions) and made it into art, more than writing it in a journal.  Susie asked us questions that gave us a path to our answers.  Almost everyone was pulled or pushed by some very strong need or desire to move forward in some specific part of our lives, to make a change, to heal zsomething or  work through something .... to grow.  

And then she gave us projects to make art..... and more projects to make art... and as we just kept making art.....you could see  what was pushing, pulling, or calling to us, because it just showed up.  And it kept showing up. Then at the end, after we had already put the big questions in our lives out there, both in our words and in our work,  she transitioned us to another place..... with playful abstract work. 

"I truly don't know how she got that much out of us in such short time, that much quantity and depth, because it always felt easy and relaxed.  She even prioritized time 1st thing in the morning in the studio for us to meditate, with a guided meditation ....before we began the artistic journey and work.  Susie is apowerful teacher.... I think maybe she has magic."

Susie Monday has taught creative process and art techniques to adults and children for more than 30 years. Her art is in numerous private and public collections around the world. WHAT HER PARTICIPANTS SAY:

 "It was Big, deep and wide and great."   

“ The exercises we did this weekend were freeing on the one hand, but will also help me focus.”

“This workshop was a fabulous, uplifting, nurturing environment to create in. The journaling was particularly helpful, I would definitely recommend it to a friend.”

“Thank you for creating such a fun, yummy, comfortable, and inspirational experience...”

“A workshop at Susie’s is always money well spent. I learned techniques I have read about but never tried ... I also now feel confident that I can make art quilts!”

“This weekend was totally awesome! I am humbled by Susie’s talents, her teaching abilities and her hospitality. I will come back as often as possible.”

Artist Journey/Artist Journal

A yearly check-in to see what you are doing as an artist and a human being. This online version of my in-person workshops (15 years plus) is a way to look at what you have done, want to do and what you are being, too.

Each Artists’ Journey/Artists’Journal workshop focuses on how to enrich, endure and keep moving ahead with your creative practice, both in art and in your “ordinary” life. Our everyday is just as much a work of creative art as any canvas, manuscript, quilt or piece of pottery.

We’ll spend 6 hours online exploring together what it takes to keep creativity alive and well as part of our studio practice and as part of our daily routines -- health, wealth, spirit and will woman adventure. Fill the creative well with writing, journal-making, collage and mixed media fun.

Workshop

A full day workshop includes live instruction, Q&A, a Zoom share and discussion of exercises, experiments and examples. PDF copies of tutorials and links to videos are included for participants. The workshop includes a focus on the creative process, a look at your past year of creativity and a self-assessment of each artist’s creative process. A supply list will be provided for at-home or guild workshop space activities. Fee is $600 for up to 15 artists.

CUSTOM DESIGNED WORKSHOPS for GUILDS and GROUPS

These are just a few of the other courses and workshops I have taught. During this Pandemic, I’m not traveling, but if any of these interest you, email me and we will see if its possible to put together an online streaming version.

These are just a few of the workshops I teach. If you would like me to present a workshop for a guild or other group, I can customize these for in-person or online workshops. Daily workshop fees start at $800, lectures for $200, plus travel expenses if applicable.

IPAD FOR FIBER ARTISTS

If you've recently acquired an iPad, this workshop will help you take it into your world of creativity and art. I've explored dozens of sketching tools, art journaling, collage and photo apps and through hands-on demos and examples, this workshop will guide your exploration of apps and then into the studio to print, make thermofaxes and use what you've done on the tablet for fabric printing to use in your art quilts, mixed media or other work. If you don't have a tablet yet (and are trying to decide what or if to buy), I teach a version that is demo and lecture only.

FROM SCRIBBLE TO SYMBOL; PERSONAL MARK-MAKING 

In this workshop, start with simple sketches and doodles and end the weekend with an arsenal of new surface design tricks and tools.   Explore doodles and scribbles as sources ofuniques and personal imagery that will give your art quilts, wearable art, or mixed media work personal depth and layers of meaning. take a favorite symbol -- for example a heart, star, spiral, circle -- and by taking it (and yourself) through a series of creative generative exercises, you’ll make something new and different to incorporate into your design, composition and surface design. Tools and techniques explored include paper lamination on fabric, large scale “mark-making” rollers and monoprinting.

KITCHEN ALTAR WORKSHOP

Embrace your inner goddess of summertime. Design and make a small art quilt “altar” for kitchen or dining room with tools and materials that depend on heat, sunlight and passionate delight: sun-printing, vegetable prints, fusing, hand and machine stitching and “found” fabrics from attic, thrift store or kitchen closet. We will recycle napkins, tea towels and other like objects and design a thermofax featuring a meaningful symbol, favorite fruit, icon, saint, culinary relative, heroine, angel or other meaningful design as the centerpiece for the altar.

NATURE INSPIRED SURFACE DESIGN

Let nature's colors, shapes and even heat inspire your surface design. The weather is perfect for dyeing, dye-painting and soy wax! Sketching from nature, and from collected natural objects (don’t worry, you can do it), we’ll design one-of-a-kind fabrics, silk scarves and mixed media pieces.

FEARLESS SKETCHING

Face your fears of drawing head on, as Susie takes you on a sketch and draw adventure, with no failures allowed. You’ll try different approaches, learn so me classic tips and tricks, and find out how drawing is a learned skill, not something you had to master as a 6th grader who “couldn’t draw horse like your best friend.”

PLAY, ART AND ATTENTION

Making time to play with odd-ball materials; learning to focus upon artful tasks at hand -- sounds like opposite sides of the coin? At this exploratory and full-of-play weekend, we’ll explore the relationship between the time, play, art and focus. Where does time management intersect with open-hearted fun? Expect bubbles, playdough, sparklers, jello, yoga and seeing the world from new angles and attitudes.

CREATIVE JUMPSTART

Are you ready to kick your creative energies into high gear? Ready to go beyond other people’s ideas and patterns and into your own? Susie will lead you through a weekend of open-ended creativity exercises, exploring the sensory alphabet, playing with a wild assortment of materials, and challenging your understanding of your mind at work. Learn more about your strong suit as an artist, and how to work in your deepest and richest material, content and processes.

Usng a variety of simple materials -- abnd an even simpler vocabulary of a sensory nonverbal "alphabet", you will paint, sketch, make music, move, listen and explore in a freeing, open-ended framework of guided exercises. In addition to these "formal" explorations, that help you expand your vocabulary of media and approaches, the weekend will include practice and planning for building effective habits and rituals for approaching your own deepest work as a human and artists. As creative beings, we are called to express our unique stories -- as visual artists we may be shackling our vision by tuning too closely to the outside world. We hope that this workshop helps you tune into your inner voice and vision, making tiny changes, babysteps that take the fear out of finding your truest work.

ARTIST JOURNEY/ARTIST JOURNAL

This annual workshop has become a tradition. Spend the weekend in creative activities that help you set the stage for a year filled with productivity, imagination, focus and art. Using original and time-tested exercises gleaned from sources around the globe, we’ll banish procrastination, make a dream board, work on a goals and artist date calendar for the year, and find ways to remind us of what really matters in our artistic lives. Meanwhile, you’ll work with mixed media and surface design techniques to start your artist’s journal and make Inspiration Cards, too. 

RECHARGE, RENEW & REVISIT! 

Move into art-making with some big scale and out-of-the-box creative exercises with paint, dye, music and more to wake up your imagination -- and then revisit work that has been hanging around the studio -- one or more UFOs (unfinished objects!). Share visions, critiques and techniques with other artists and take time in the studio to finish, remake or rethink work in progress.