Hands-on Art
Note: Cancellations will be refunded up to 7 days prior to the event, minus ticketing fees.
Grace Welker: Where I’m From- A Write Yourself Down Workshop
Sat September 19, 2026 @ 2:00 pm – 4:30 pmEscalante, 84726
Just like visual art, writing offers an invitation to reflect on our relationship with the lands we inhabit, those we choose and the ones we are born onto. We are first shaped by the people and places that raise us, their sights, sounds, smells, and stories residing deep in our bones. In this afternoon workshop, we consider George Ella Lyon’s poem “Where I’m From” as we listen, write, discuss, share, and participate in bringing forth the lands we each carry within ourselves as well as the land we are meeting on.
Supplies provided by students: Bring paper or a notebook and a pen or pencil.
Cost: Free
Maximum of 20 / Minimum of 2
No writing experience necessary.
Grace Welker, MEd, MFA, is a lifelong reader, writer, and traveler, who currently lives in Escalante. She channeled her passion for communication first into a career in English as a Second/Foreign Language, then into editorial direction and content curation in the fields of holistic health and personal transformation. She is the author of Oasis Pages: Teen Writing Quest, an engaging roadmap for developing a daily writing habit. In addition, she is the Escalante elementary school librarian.
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Suzanne Gibson: Playing With Primaries
Fri September 25, 2026 @ 9:00 am – 12:00 pm
“Playing with Primaries” is an introduction to plein air instruction. How planning, watching and studying the shapes can take a Plein Air study from sketch to finished painting. This Year’s Instructional Workshop and Demonstration is suitable for all levels. It will be presented in Water Mixable Oils.
Cost: $35
Maximum of 15
All ability levels
Style: California Impressionist
Born – Northern England, Has lived in Southern California for over 40 years, and resides with her husband and 3 children in the South Bay.
As an Artist and Designer, Suzanne has her BA in Interior Design and has been teaching art for over 25 years to students ranging from 3 years to 101.
Suzanne was added to the faculty at the Plein Air Convention and Expo as a Field Artist/Instructor and ambassador to the Scholarship Program.
In 2023 added Escalante’s Utah to her list of favorite places to paint, and in 2024 participated and was awarded 2nd Place in the Drawing category with her ink drawing of the People’s Exchange.
2025 awarded Honorable Mention at the Moulton Museum in Laguna Woods.
Learn more about Suzanne’s art at https://suzannes-studio-fine-art-design-art-instruction.square.site/
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Jill Simkins: Mosaic Wall Art
Fri September 25, 2026 @ 12:30 pm – 4:00 pm
A mosiac artwork is a handmade tradition of using small colored stones that dates back thousands of years to the Ancient Greek and Roman era. They constructed elaborate wall decorations and geometric designs in flooring and pathways. Modern mosaics are created with all kinds of materials. Buttons, shells, charms, beads, broken pottery, ceramic plates, and costume jewelry.
An 8”x 6” board, adhesive, grout, and bits and pieces of glass and pottery will be provided. Please bring a pair of safety glasses, a hammer, an idea or sketch to create, and any items you wish to add.
Cost: $35
Maximum of 25 / Minimum of 5 / All ability levels.
Please bring a pair of safety glasses, hammer, tile nippers (a few will be available to share) an old towel, and a sponge. Also bring miscellaneous plates, tile, broken vases, and ceramic pieces if available, and a sketch of your desired design.
Jill is an Organic Vegetable Farmer who creates art in many mediums; using plants and flowers, magical garden paths, oil or water-color paint, clay, and by using recycled, found or worn out items. Living her life working outside in the soil and discovering this beautiful world by hiking, backpacking, catering horse-pack trips in the High Uintah’s, river rafting, or camping in her vintage trailer, has given her a great respect and love for the outdoors, which she attempts to capture on canvas. She especially enjoys painting cows, farm animals, and people. Her work has been sold in several galleries throughout the West.
She writes about her painting and adventures here.
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Raymond King Shurtz: Short Fiction using Landscape Paintings
Sat September 26, 2026 @ 9:00 am – 12:00 pm
Cost: $35
Minimum of 3 / Maximum of 12 / All ability levels
In this session, we will be using a plein air painting of your choice from the festival to write a short fiction story. The first hour we will talk about short fiction and choose the painting we will write from. The second hour we will write our story, integrating character, setting, conflict, plot and theme from our painting. The last hour we will read our stories and talk about the readings. This is a magical way to work!
Western Interiors
“…It was as if suddenly the sky and cliffs were bound to these men whose ancestors had stood in the same spot, three hundred years before, when there were no weathermen to explain the way and why the violent sky moved…”
Please bring a computer or notebook, and a cell phone with a camera if possible.
Raymond King Shurtz has written more than 30 plays, three published with Samuel French and Anchorage Press/Dramatic Publishing. The Founding Artistic Director of Playwright’s Workshop Theatre in Phoenix, Raymond produced eighty new plays in his 12-year tenure with the company. In 1998, he began teaching, theatre, film and humanities at Metro Arts, a high school for the performing and visual arts in Phoenix, Arizona, where he taught and produced another ten years of new theatre. His play, Blue Baby, A Memoir won the Playwriting Fellowship in 2003 from the Arizona Commission on the Arts. Since 2008, he has worked as a free-lance director, actor, writer, and musician.
In 2009, Raymond produced and performed his one man show, Bohemian Cowboy at The Elephant Theatre, which was the ‘pick of the week’ in The LA Weekly, and subsequently performed it approximately seventy-five times in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Salt Lake City, Southern Utah, and twenty-three shows in Austin, Texas. He also fronts a country/rock/western band, Out on Bail, and also performs solo acoustic shows for Hilton Hotels. His Anthology, ‘Seven Plays of the American West’ was released in 2019 by Five Sisters Press. All of his plays are available on Amazon, Dramatic Publishing, Samuel French, and Five Sisters Press.
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Tera Connor: Create a Gourd Birdhouse
Sat September 26, 2026 @ 12:30 pm – 3:30 pm
In this engaging art class, you will create a birdhouse for your cherished feathered companions.
Cost: $35
Minimum of 10 / Maximum of 15 / All ability levels
Students are encouraged to bring an apron or paint shirt for this hands-on, creative class. Participants will design and build their very own gourd birdhouse, perfect for welcoming feathered friends to the yard.
Each student will select a gourd from a variety of sizes and shapes, then carefully clean and prepare it for its new life as a birdhouse. With guided instruction, students will use drills (with supervision) to create the entrance, wire hanger holes, and ventilation holes.
To finish, participants can personalize their birdhouse with a rich stain and decorative artistic touches. By the end of class, everyone will leave with a one-of-a-kind gourd birdhouse ready to hang and enjoy at home.
Tera Connor is a retired elementary school teacher who has grown into a passionate gourd gardener and artisan. Gardening in Sandy Valley, Nevada, she carefully harvests and dries her own gourds, transforming them into beautiful, functional pieces.
With a deep love for repurposing and crafting, Tera has spent the past 15 years creating handcrafted gourd birdhouses. She especially enjoys hanging them around her home, where they provide safe havens for local birds and bring a touch of natural charm to her surroundings.
See more of Tera’s work on Instagram: @thepinkpolkadott
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