National Portrait Gallery Announces New Workshop Series: Studio Time

The Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery announced a new workshop series called Studio Time. Each session of Studio Time offers adults the chance to take a small group lesson from a contemporary artist whose work has been collected or displayed by the Portrait Gallery.

Artists selected to lead the class will demonstrate their technique and help participants create their own artwork. Each month, a different artist will lead the session, providing opportunities to work with varying techniques and materials. The first three sessions, described in more detail below, will be led by Mary Borgman, Mequitta Ahuja and Jennifer Levonian, who currently have work on display in the Portrait Gallery.

Classes are held on select Saturdays from 10:30 a.m. to noon, and are limited to 20 participants. Participants must arrive in the G Street lobby by 10:15 a.m. Registration is required and a $50 fee includes all materials. For registration and payment information, email studiotime@si.edu.

May 11: Mary Borgman
Borgman, whose charcoal-on-Mylar works now appear in “Portraiture Now: Drawing on the Edge,” will show her techniques for lighting and drawing portraits, and help participants start their own charcoal-on-Mylar drawing.

June 8: Mequitta Ahuja
Ahuja, whose works now appear in “Portraiture Now: Drawing on the Edge,” will show her techniques for mixed-media printmaking and help participants create their own mixed-media artwork.

July 13: Jennifer Levonian
Levonian will lead an animation workshop. Each participant will have the chance to create his or her own animation figure, adding it to a short collaborative piece, based on Levonian’s techniques. Levonian is a prize winner in the 2013 Outwin Boochever Portrait Competition and her animation is currently on display in the exhibition.

Studio Time is sponsored in part by The Reed Foundation Inc., with additional support from the Reinsch Family Education Endowment. National Portrait Gallery

The Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery tells the history of America through the individuals who have shaped its culture. Through the visual arts, performing arts and new media, the Portrait Gallery portrays poets and presidents, visionaries and villains, actors and activists whose lives tell the American story. The National Portrait Gallery, part of the Donald W. Reynolds Center for American Art and Portraiture, is located at Eighth and F streets N.W., Washington, D.C. Smithsonian Information: (202) 633-1000. Website: npg.si.edu.

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SI-155-2013