VFAA 10th Annual Fall Artist Retreat
Contributed by Martha Happs
Valley Fine Arts Association is excited to announce our 10th Annual Artist Retreat at the beautiful North Star Bible Camp in Willow, Alaska. The retreat will be held on August 15-17, 2025 from 8:30 am Friday to 3pm on Sunday. Early Birds can come on Thursday after 5pm to get settled into your room and join in on a potluck in the Susitna commons. We have a variety of classes being offered from Alaskan Artists. You can also Plein Air paint or just relax and paint your own canvas.
Chris Zafren will be teaching a two-part class on Saturday about collage. The first three-hour session will be teaching techniques that produce acrylic painted tissue papers for your collage. The second session after a delicious lunch will be applying shapes and colors from your painted papers to form a collage on a canvas. It’s a very fun process. Chris will demonstrate the strategies she uses for collage.
Barbara Johnson will be teaching a class on Friday morning about Nature Journaling. Barb is a retired teacher that enjoys nature and journaling while in nature. She says “Nature Journaling is a way for me to connect more closely with nature and keep a record of natural events that take place around me. It is also a very healing and meditative practice.
Renee Morhain is a full-time art teacher. She teaches at Blaines Art store in Anchorage, does private lessons and works with homeschoolers. She will have a variety of acrylic classes available. She will show you techniques on capturing a beautiful landscape. A fun class on multimedia and how to design it. She will bring different acrylic mediums for you to try out in the multi mediums class. And have you heard of Acrylic Skins? In this class she will show you how to create Acrylic Skins and make a collage out of them. She says, “I always strive to give each person a positive experience and a fun creative outlook on life”.
Gina Murrow is a multi-talented artist and is teaching a variety of classes also. She has two classes in pet portraits. First is to paint your favorite domestic animal in pastels, oils or acrylics. Learn techniques that captures their personality and what sets them apart from other animals. Her second pet class is called “The Eyes Have It “. Learn how the eyes are a window with animals. Certain traits identify different animals’ eyes. Learn to capture the shape, color and depths unique to each animal. Gina’s third class will be Travel Journaling.
Learn what supplies to bring, plein air painting with various mediums, bring wet painting home, how to pass through TSA, taking a train, road tripping and traveling to other countries. Also, a travel sketching lesson about grabbing a sketch on the go. On Sunday morning she will be teaching slik scarf painting. Learn how to paint on silk and take home your own hand painted silk scarf.
The VFAA retreat is in a beautiful atmosphere at North Star Bible Camp on the back side of Hatcher Pass outside of Willow. It’s a fun and relaxing time with other artists. Meals are provided and accommodations are lower bunk beds with 5 beds per room with bathrooms in each room. Food is served in the spacious Loon Lodge at designated times. We will also be having evening activities such as bonfires, movies and games with prizes. Our sponsors so far include Ampersand (gessobord panels), Winsor & Newton, Liquitex(paints) and M.Graham (honey watercolors and acrylics) These and other sponsors to come are very generous with their samples to our artists. It is wonderful to try out their quality products.
Membership to Valley Fine Arts Association is $25 per year. There is a limited availability for VFAA scholarships to attend the retreat. Contact VFAA on their website. Retreat costs for members are August 15-17 (2 nights and 6 meals) $250, for one night the cost is $125 for members (with 3 meals) Classes are three hour sessions for $25 and Early Birds are $30 arriving after 5pm on Thursday.
Come enjoy the artist retreat with VFAA !!!
To register go to our website: valleyfinearts.org or go to eventbrite and type in VFAA 10th Annual Fall Artist Retreat