Tapping into one’s inner artist is no different than learning to ride a bike, Frankfort artist Carol Chirafisi says.
“Nobody was born knowing how to ride a bike,” Chirafisi said. “But you tell someone what they have to do, you maybe hold onto the seat for a while … and then they’re pedaling along.”
“Holding onto the seat” translates into art teachers offering students, especially those with little or no art experience, “background and support and encourage(ment) to adapt what they’ve learned to their own ideas,” Chirafisi said.
And that kind of instruction is available at a number of Southland sites.
Vogt Visual Arts Center (VVAC) in Tinley Park, The Center in Palos Park, Greater Chicago Artisan Center in Oak Lawn and McCord Gallery and Cultural Center in Palos Park are among the many locations offering artists at every level a variety of classes taught by experienced teachers.
Chirafisi, 71, has a 25-year background teaching art to adults. She currently teaches oil painting, painting with acrylics and art exploration classes at Vogt Visual Arts Center, an open painting class at the Midlothian Public Library, and an oil painting/small painting class at Hobby Lobby in Tinley Park.
Chirafisi said most people want to try painting because “they’ve seen something they want to portray and they just don’t know where to begin.”
That’s where a good instructor comes in, Chirafisi said. The instructor helps the would-be artist to understand that everyone has the potential to create.
“A painter is like a photographer in that they are capturing a moment in time, but the artist’s unique touch — like their written signature — makes the piece unlike anyone else’s,” she said.
“No two people can — or will — paint the same way. You will develop your own signature style of painting and that comes with time,” she said.
Chirafisi encourages her students to find their inner artist by becoming more like the young child they once were, “always delighted with what they draw although they are not taught.”
Fellow art teacher Carmelo Schifano is happy to have adults bring childlike joy to his class. He said he will do whatever he can to relax his students, using laughter, music and refreshments while encouraging each one to “lose your fear.”
“I try to incorporate humor,” Schifano said.
On the first night of a beginning watercolor class, for example, Schifano will “load” his brush with paint and let it plop “accidentally” onto the art paper.
He said his feigned upset at his mistake breaks the ice every time.
“That loosens everybody up,” Schifano said.
Schifano, 63, has 38 years’ experience teaching some form of art to skill and age levels ranging from elementary-age students to adults.
He currently teaches classes in beginning watercolor at VVAC, LaGrange Art League; Naperville Art League and McCord Gallery and Cultural Center.
Art student Susan Trump, 63, of Tinley Park, said in 2015 she took a colored pencil art class at VVAC — her first foray into art instruction since high school — and then signed up for Schifano’s water color class to “try something different.”
Trump, retired from a 24-year career in cardio rehab at Metro South Hospital, said Schifano’s class is just what the doctor ordered.
“I just do find it relaxing and I enjoy challenging myself by learning something new,” she said.
Relaxation is among the many reasons people give for pursuing the creative arts, Chirafisi said. She said students often remark after the end of a two-hour session that they “don’t know where the time has gone.”
“The main thing is, I think, is relaxation,” Chirafisi said. “It’s a very relaxing time spent for a few hours. Whenever you’re working with that type of unique expression, it isn’t literal, it’s not analytical, it’s the non-abstract. You kind of lose yourself in it for a couple of hours.”
The good news for those who may not know what they want to pursue is to take advantage of the trend at several sites: offer students exposure to a variety of media in short one or two-course sessions.
The VVAC offers an open painting class in oils, acrylics and watercolors so all levels of students can “pursue their area of interest” in a relaxed atmosphere. A two-hour “mini session” for beginning oil painting is designed to help new students ease into the fine arts “without making a huge commitment.”
The Center in Palos Park offers art and craft workshops of one or two sessions to accommodate busy moms or those who want to dabble without committing to weeks of class, art director Heather Young said. She said the range of classes at The Center includes everything from fine arts to folk art with back to back sessions during the fall and winter months.
For those seeking to learn about fine crafts, the Greater Chicago Artisan Center, the educational arm of Art Clay World USA, Inc., in Oak Lawn, offers classes in a wide variety of media and certification in some crafts in as little as three days. McCord Gallery and Cultural Center offers open studio classes with guided instruction and a one-session silk-painting workshop.
For more information on Vogt Visual Arts Center classes, go to www.tinleyparkdistrict.org or call 708-614-6503; on McCord Gallery and Cultural Center, go to www.mccordgallery.org or call 708-671-.0648; on The Great American Artisan Center, go to www.artclayworld.com or call 708-857-8800; on The Center at www.thecenterpalos.org or call 708-361-3650.
Ginger Brashinger is a freelance reporter for the Daily Southtown.
