Skill Level: Beginner to Advanced

If you are interested in developing a rich and layered surface, this course will allow you to expand your palette and skills in making work that is personally relevant and dynamic. By incorporating drawing, photography, scanning, and collage techniques to develop imagery. Techniques such as China paint, decals, slips, and under and over glazes will be explored. These processes will be used on a variety of forms, such as tiles and plates, as well as work you make during this exciting workshop. Overall, the effect is one of depth and richness not typically found in single fire glazes. We will be working with porcelain, exploring its multitude of forming and decorative possibilities.

Anna Calluori Holcombe was born in Newark, New Jersey, of Italian immigrant parents. She received her MFA in Ceramics from Louisiana State University. Since then, she has been teaching in higher education and recently retired from the University of Florida as Professor Emeritus. In 1997, she was honored as a Fellow of the NCECA and again in 2023, with an Excellence in Teaching award. She is an elected member of the International Academy of Ceramics. Calluori Holcombe exhibits nationally and internationally. She was a Fulbright Scholar at Anadolu University in Turkey.

Learn more: annaholcombe.com

Fee: $590 + $40 Non-Refundable Registration Fee

Skill Level: Beginner to Advanced

Join us for a 5-day basket weaving workshop with award winning weaver Cael Chappell! This hands-on experience will take you on a creative journey, where you'll learn the art of twined basketry using waxed linen thread. Each day will be filled with in-depth instruction to create unique, personalized baskets. Cael's expertise and passion will guide you through the process, from planning your project to completing beautiful baskets. Whether you're a beginner or a seasoned weaver, this workshop promises to be an enriching experience.

Cael Chappell has been working with basket weavers in Africa since 1991. In 2017 he started weaving his own baskets. Because of his deep understanding of basketry, he quickly developed his own unique style of whimsical weaving. His baskets exhibit personality and life which engages viewers. His work has been featured in many exhibitions and publications. Cael enjoys teaching and is writing a book on twining baskets with waxed linen thread. He has presented many lectures to weaving guilds and groups across the country.

Learn more: caelchappell.com

Fee: $550 + $40 Non-Refundable Registration Fee

Skill Level: Beginner To Advanced

The act of walking is one of the most basic constants of the human condition, and is often a solo endeavor of short duration, covering the “last mile” between destination points. But there are creative and cultural spaces where walking serves as a shared modality for deep engagement and contemplation, and where both an investigation and a heightened awareness of our internal and external environments is undertaken. In this research and practice-based workshop, we will explore as a collective, some of these cultural spaces as formed through the artistic practice of Dérive, and the act of creating and walking an outdoor seven-circuit classic labyrinth.

Christopher Kaczmarek is a New York based artist whose work spans both experimental and traditional practice. His work is often interactive and designed to guide the viewer towards a deeper contemplation about the active and passive roles they play in their inhabited environments (aka, Derive). Kaczmarek received both his MFA degree in Visual Art, and a MA in Modern and Contemporary Art History from SUNY Purchase, New York. He is currently Associate Professor of Interdisciplinary Art and is Chair of the Department of Art and Design at Montclair State University. Kaczmarek has presented his work internationally, including Canada, Ireland, Greece, USA, China, Scotland, Spain, and South Korea.

Learn more: chriskaczmarek.com

Fee: $530 + $40 Non-Refundable Registration Fee

Skill Level: Beginner To Advanced

This workshop is an exploration of color using natural dyes and pigments. Participants will create color from raw materials such as cochineal, malachite, clay, oak gall, and black walnuts, for use in a diverse group of water-based binders, from gum arabic to distemper to egg tempera. We will explore the potentials of color, and how materials carry content through history, context, physical and aesthetic properties. Considerations of the environmental impact of materials will offer a framework for maintaining a sustainable safe painting practice. Participants will create a set of handmade watercolor paints, a color swatch book, and exploratory paintings on paper, textile, and panel.

Patricia Miranda is an artist, curator, educator, and founder of “The Lace Archive,” “The Crit Lab,” and “MAPSpace.” Grants include the Ruth and Harold Chenven Foundation, Northern Manhattan Arts Alliance, Arts Westchester, Anonymous Was a Woman Relief Grant, and a NEA grant working with homeless youth. Solo exhibitions include Olin Fine Art Center, 3S Artspace, Jane Street Art Center, and group exhibitions Spartanburg Art Museum, Dunedin Fine Art Center; Lyman Allyn Museum. Recent reviews include Art New England and Brooklyn Rail.

Learn more: patriciamiranda.com

Fee: $550 + $40 Non-Refundable Registration Fee

Skill Level: The ability to wheel-throw a cylinder is encouraged

Join us for 5 days of exploring imaginative approaches to creating zoomorphic pottery. Using techniques of throwing and hand-building, students will form vessels that incorporate animal figures by sculpting, carving, and alteration. Instruction will cover basic sculpting techniques such as the hollowing method and how to give their animals expression and detail. Katherine will provide individual guidance with each student to achieve a pleasing composition, structural integrity, and personal meaning in their finished work. The workshop also includes one glaze firing.

Katherine Maloney is a studio artist based on her family’s farm in Southeast Virginia. She received her BA in Ceramics at Guilford College and has participated in artist-in-residence programs, including STARworks Ceramics and as an assistant at Peters Valley ceramics studio. Katherine has taught workshops regionally and exhibited work nationally at galleries and prestigious shows including the Smithsonian Craft Show.

Learn more: katherinemaloney.org

Fee: $570 + $40 Non-Refundable Registration Fee

Skill Level: Beginner To Advanced

This exciting workshop will emphasize ancient Chinese methodologies and concepts for painting and decorating on porcelain greenware, bisqueware, and glaze ware. Processes, that include applying “Qing Hua” cobalt pigment, color underglazes, glazes, computer decal transfers and China paints, will be shared. Students will learn two major brush painting techniques; fine-line brush painting and board brush expression. Ways of painting symbols and patterns, like bamboo, chrysanthemum, orchid, plum blossom, peony, dragonflies, and the iconic goldfish, will be covered. By understanding color field and exploring the subconscious, participants will connect with their body, mind, and soul.

Sin-ying Ho received her MFA from Louisiana State University in 2001. Ho is Associate Professor at Queens College, CUNY. She has taught and presented many international workshops, lectures, and exhibitions including New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art, and in China’s preeminent City of Porcelain, Jingdezhen.

Learn more: sinyingho.com

Phil Read received his MFA from Maine College of Art and Design. He has studied the art and techniques of Chinese Brush Painting/Sumi-e for 30 years. Read has presented workshops to artists and students from all over North America and exhibits internationally. He maintains a studio in Jingdezhen, China.

Fee: $595 (includes first bag of clay) + $40 Non-Refundable Registration Fee

Skill Level: Beginner to Advanced

Drawing from traditional English rush weaving techniques, this workshop will delve into working with locally harvested cattail leaves found here in the Catskills. This unique course will extend the student’s basket weaving skills through constructing smaller baskets and culminating with weaving a sun hat. Expect to leave Sugar Maples with the knowledge and practice to harvest, prepare and weave baskets from this abundant wetland plant. No previous basketry experience required! From the knowledge gained, students will be prepared to investigate Nature and select, harvest, and make objects of beauty from what they find.

Renee Baumann is a Catskills-based chef and designer who specializes in working with wild plants and fungi. She rediscovered her childhood love for basketry when she was unhappy with the sourdough bread baskets she could buy and decided to make them herself. She works in many media, builds cob ovens, bakes bread and pastries and obsesses over finding and eating wild mushrooms.

Learn more: instagram.com/renee_makes_things/

Fee: $340 + $40 Non-Refundable Registration Fee

Skill Level: Beginner To Advanced

Sugar Maples is thrilled to announce that for the first time in our history, we are offering an opportunity for those who would like to write. This will be a workshop with one of the country’s most special writers. If you are interested in writing about art, craft, or memoir, this workshop will infuse your thinking and writing with new ways of looking at our world of creativity. There will be discussions and exercises aimed at helping you hone your ideas, sharpen your vision, explore language, and experiment with the infinite ways of words. Learn how to construct and submit manuscripts for publication by journals, online media, and book publishers. Participants will have full access to our beautiful, sunny studio that’s replete with lots of table room, potters’ wheels, WIFI, art/craft library, and a supportive atmosphere. Note* You don’t have to be an artist to take this workshop!

Vince Montague received his Master’s Degree in Creative Writing from NYU in 1989 and soon after began publishing short stories in literary magazines. He also enjoyed a twenty-year career as an adjunct instructor of writing at colleges and universities around San Fransisco Bay Area. His late wife was a filmmaker and potter who died tragically in a car accident in 2009. During her lifetime, he never touched clay but after her death he began to study clay on his own. In 2014, he left his teaching career, reopened his wife’s ceramic studio and began making art for a living. Since that time, Vince has become a noted sculptor and ceramicist.

Montague’s stories and poems have been published in literary and academic journals, including California Quarterly, Westwind, The Florida Review, Talking River Review, Other Voices, Nimrod: An International Journal, and Green Mountain Review. He has been an artist-in-residence at Carrizozo AIR (New Mexico), Playa Summer Lake (Oregon), and Willapa Bay (Washington). His hybrid memoir, Cracked Pot, a broken chronicle of grief and art, was recently published by Latah Books.

Learn more: instagram.com/vincemontague

Fee: $325 + $40 Non-Refundable Registration Fee