Thank you for your interest in studying with me. I run two different schools. I have also recently begun a new school for landscape painting. I will try to explain each, clarify how they are different, and give a sense of their relative merits.
THE GRAND CENTRAL ACADEMY OF ART
In the fall of 2006, I founded The Grand Central Academy of Art with a group of fellow artists whom I hold in the highest regard. They are all alumni of my first school, The Water Street Atelier, and helped me make it what it has been for more than a decade: a place where serious students can acquire the foundation of a classical education.
I had spent several years since Water Street’s inception, however, thinking about how to make a more robust, more perfect classical art school, one that ultimately could not be accommodated in an atelier setting. The Grand Central Academy — with its dedicated and talented teachers, larger physical space and more structured and contemplated curriculum — is my attempt to answer the surging desires of a generation of young artists who want the most rigorous and thorough education in the classical and traditional arts.
The Academy, first and foremost, offers a four-year full-time program, with around fifteen students in each year. The methodology is built on the approaches taught in the ateliers of the 15th through 19th centuries and which we developed successfully at Water Street: cast drawing and grisaille painting, progressing through to figure drawing and ultimately to figure painting. GCA’s core program, however, goes beyond this, with copying paintings at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, a thorough study of perspective, anatomy with écorché and dissection, portraiture, painting methods and materials, plein air oil sketch, color theory and composition, and art history for painters — all taught by professional artists. The historical relationship between painting, sculpture and architecture is reflected in the core curriculum, which also introduces architectural drawing and figure sculpture. Each distinct stage in the student’s education was conceived and is controlled by a larger trajectory, the end of which is to give the student the skills and understanding necessary to create classically inspired paintings finely conceived and excellently executed.
We have also recently created a sculpture core program at the GCA. The sculptors and painters start out drawing the casts and figure together. They will also study anatomy and art history together, but the sculptors will lean more towards three-dimensional work, eventually working full time in the sculpture studio.
The Grand Central Academy also offers a varied and comprehensive array of evening and weekend classes as well as workshops, all geared toward the serious student of classical art. The school sponsors lectures and festivals, and the tight-knit group of students frequently organizes book groups and talks, adding another dynamic to this already full and vibrant community. The Academy is an intense community exposing students to the ideas and technical methods of a group of the leading classical artists in New York. Although these artists all have a great deal in common, their differences offer the students some variety of ideas. The GCA’s location in Midtown Manhattan has made it a natural center of the burgeoning renaissance in the classical arts that the United States and the rest of the world are enjoying today.
If you are interested in either the core program or the part-time courses at The Grand Central Academy of Art, please see its website:
grandcentralacademy.classicist.org
THE WATER STREET ATELIER
My atelier is no longer on Water Street, but I have kept the name.
I teach about twelve young artists to draw and paint in my own studio. The studio has two parts. The back room is my private studio. In the larger front room I work on figure paintings from models and teach. Students come to study with me full time for about four years. I teach a relatively simple and clear approach, so I can't teach all methods, but I try to explain everything I understand about drawing. New students work on drawing and then painting plaster casts of antique sculptures for about a year. During this time they also draw the figure in the afternoons, working on long and short poses. After finishing with the casts the student starts working from the figure full time, starting with long pose (three to four week) pencil drawings. Then he or she will paint the figure in grisaille, and then in color. I also discuss still-life painting and landscape painting.
I instruct year round except August, although when I am finishing a portrait commission or frantically painting for a show I will hardly teach at all. I usually have one or more of my former students come in to teach once a week. A few times a year we will do something different, like a landscape painting trip, or I will invite a guest artist to teach a workshop.
What I teach in my own studio is very particular and a perfect fit for some young artists. But it is certainly not for everyone. It is rigorous and classical and requires tremendous patience and dedication. Because the environment in my studio is relatively informal and unstructured, students here need to be self-motivated. They also need to be aware that although I teach a coherent set of skills and an aesthetic sensibility, I cannot offer a comprehensive training. They need to have the motivation to pursue their own serious studies of anatomy, perspective, sculpture, and art history. These, and more, are all needed to complement the practices they are learning in the studio. It is a good fit for students who want to learn how I draw and paint, who want on some level to be particularly influenced by me. In this way it fits in the pre-academic tradition of the artist's training. Until the middle of the 19th century students would learn in the studio of a particular painter. During that time they would strive to learn that painter's particular craft and ideas. When they were done, they would work to develop their own voice and style.
I take on three or four new students a year. I am looking for applicants who love the great tradition of art and want to be part of it. I am not especially biased toward technically advanced students. Some of the students who have done best with me have come in with very little training but with a great deal of artistic energy and an open mind. Only students who can make a full time commitment (8:30-5:00) will be considered.
If you are interested in studying with me at my studio, I will be happy to look at your work. Please email me images of your work and a short bio to:
wsa (at) jacobcollinspaintings (dot) com
THE HUDSON RIVER SCHOOL FOR LANDSCAPE
The Hudson River School for Landscape will build a new movement of American art, modeling itself after the artistic, social and spiritual values of the Hudson River School painters. It will bring together the reawakening enthusiasm for the old American painters, the vigorous but unfocused scene of contemporary landscape painting and the urgent need for a renewed reverence for the land. By bringing back the skills and spirit of the pre-impressionist landscape painters the program will give much needed direction to a new generation of painters. As they learn to carefully study and reflect on the trees and clouds and blades of grass and cliffs, their paintings will become beautiful. Ideally, these artists and their beautiful representations of nature will help to lead the culture back to a stronger connection to the landscape. The school seeks to make a contribution both to the art world and the conservation movement.
