Portrait and Landscape Painting
with
Antony Williams & Caroline Bays

🗓️ August 28th to September 4th 2027

🎨 Oil & Acrylic Paint

Full Board Accommodation: From 1,750€

for 7 nights

Tutor's Fee: €500

Partners & family may join the trip as non-participating guests without the teaching fee.

Accommodation

Caroline's Website

Antony's Website

Course Description

This unique course offers the opportunity of painting the landscape with Caroline & the figure in the landscape with Antony in the beautiful grounds of the Rignana Estate.

Landscape Painting

You will be painting en plein air & there will be an emphasis on drawing & how to create recession with scale, colour and perspective.

We will also look at compositional themes for landscape and students will be encouraged to use a variety of painting techniques. There will be demonstrations and advice given on the craft of painting.

Figure in the landscape

There will be an emphasis on drawing the structure of the figure and how the figure relates to the landscape within a composition. We will also be looking at how to tackle the challenge of capturing the figure in different lighting effects. Depending on the weather, painting will take place either in the grounds of the estate or in the studio.

Anchor 2

Course Outline

Saturday

16:00 - Check in & Estate Tour

18:00 - Welcome aperitivo followed by dinner

Sunday

08:30 - 9:30 - Italian breakfast

10:00 - 13:00 - Morning Session: Caroline will start with a simple landscape demonstration in oils. There will be an emphasis on drawing, creating perspective & oil painting techniques. Students to start their own paintings.

13:00 - 14:00 - Farm to table lunch at Rignana

14:30 - 16:00 - Afternoon session: Students to continue painting.

16:00 - 16:30 - Review of student’s paintings

18:30 - Aperitivo followed by dinner

Monday

08:30 - 9:30 - Italian breakfast

10:00 - 13:00 - Morning session: Caroline will demonstrate in acrylics with an emphasis on composition, colour values & mark making for landscape. Students to continue paintings.

13:00 - 14:00 - Farm to table lunch at Rignana

14:30 - 16:30 - Afternoon session: Students to continue painting.

18:30 - Aperitivo followed by dinner

Tuesday

08:30 - 9:30 - Italian breakfast

10:00 - 13:00 - Morning session: Students to finish off their paintings followed by an evaluation of their work.

13:00 - 14:00 - Farm to table lunch at Rignana

14:30 - 16:30 - Afternoon session: Antony will start with a demonstration of the figure in monochrome in the grounds of the estate; emphasising the structure of the figure, tonal relationships & oil painting techniques. Students will start their own paintings.

18:30 - Aperitivo followed by dinner

Wednesday

08:30 - 9:30 - Italian breakfast

Class Break — Stay at the retreat and relax, or visit Florence for the day

Thursday

08:30 - 9:30 - Italian breakfast

10:00 - 13:00 - Morning session: Antony will demonstrate painting the figure in the landscape using colour. Emphasising drawing, composition, colour relationships & the effects of light. Students to start their own paintings.

13:00 - 14:00 - Farm to table lunch at Rignana

14:30 - 16:30 - Afternoon session: Students to start a new painting of the figure.

18:30 - Aperitivo followed by dinner

Friday

08:30 - 9:30 - Italian breakfast

10:00 - 13:00 - Morning session: Students to continue painting.

13:00 - 14:00 - Farm to table lunch at Rignana

14:30 - 16:30 - Afternoon session: Students to finish their paintings followed by an evaluation of their work.

18:30 - Aperitivo followed by dinner

Saturday

08:30 - 9:30 - Italian breakfast

10:00 -Check out

About Antony

Antony trained at both Farnham & Portsmouth, his work is based on intense observation, particularly of human flesh, creating as a result, a heightened sense of realism. He works almost exclusively in tempera – a painstaking, exacting medium in which egg is used instead of linseed oil as the binding medium. While oil allows for a degree of flexibility and manipulation of the painted surface before it dries, this technique does not easily allow for alteration. It was this medium that Williams used for his remarkable portrait of the Queen in 1996.

His work has been recognised with numerous awards, including first prize in the Herbert Smith Freehills Portrait Award 2024 at the National Portrait Gallery in July 2024. Williams’s work is held in notable public collections including the National Portrait Gallery; Royal Collection; House of Commons; MCC Lords; Garrick Club; Corpus Christi, Oxford; Trinity Hall, Cambridge; Queens College, Oxford and a number of significant private collections. Williams trained at Farnham College of Art and Portsmouth University. He is Vice President of the Royal Society of Portrait Painters and is a member of the New English Art Club.

About Caroline

Caroline trained at both Epsom School of Art & Roehampton University, her work is born from observation of the world around her, whether it’s a still life, a portrait painted in the studio or a landscape painted on location. And although the work is primarily based on observation, she has her own unique vision of the reality she chooses to depict and interpret in her work. Colours are often heightened, and objects can be altered in subtle ways to create a composition which she finds satisfying. The paintings are as a result, quiet, contemplative, beautifully observed, and often playful in the arrangement of the various elements in a composition.

Caroline is a member of the Pastel Society UK, she regularly exhibits at the Royal Society of Portrait Painters & exhibited at the HSF Portrait Award at the National Portrait Gallery in 2024. She has her work in private collections in the UK, Europe & the USA.