Large-scale painting invites us to use our entire body, turning mark-making into a physical experience. This two-day intensive brings that expansive energy into dialogue with the natural world, exploring how scale can amplify the composition, energy, mood, colour, and texture of our environment. Rather than replicating the landscape literally, we will use the outdoors as a catalyst for intuitive, gestural and abstract expression as well as incorporating nature directly into our creations. .

Led by artist and ARAS Creative Director Evan Faith Hutchinson, this workshop fuses the raw sensory inspiration of the Wychwood Barns grounds and studio experimentation. We will break away from traditional easels while working flat on the floor or propped high on the studio walls to engage with our surfaces in a tactile way. Guided by the atmospheric light of Monet and Matisse, alongside the powerful, process-driven gestures of Helen Frankenthaler, Joan Mitchell, and Lee Krasner, you will explore techniques like staining, gesture drawing, scraping, and smearing. This weekend offers a supportive, meditative space to embrace the unpredictable and be engulfed through working BIG.

Day 1: Outdoor Studies & Fluid Foundations

• Morning | The Landscape as Catalyst: We begin outdoors, gathering raw visual and sensory material from our surroundings. Through in-studio sketches and mixed-media studies, we will translate the textures and palettes of the natural world into an abstract vocabulary.
• Afternoon | Working Flat: Moving into the studio, we confront the large-scale surface. Working flat on the floor, you will learn to guide fluid stains and atmospheric washes, letting the paint interact organically with the canvas.

Day 2: Gestural Layering & Structural Resolution

• Morning | Vertical Energy: We shift our canvases onto the walls to explore the physical, high-energy mark-making of Abstract Expressionists like Mitchell and Krasner. Here, you will experiment with more visceral, tactile applications using scraping, smearing, and layering.
• Afternoon | Refining the Canvas: The final session focuses on bringing cohesion to your large-scale work. We will discuss how to balance intuitive chaos with deliberate structure, concluding the weekend with an informal, encouraging group reflection on the completed pieces.