Artful Assemblage with Tim Holtz: Class Review

On Friday, I had the great good fortune to take a class with Tim Holtz called artful assemblage. The class focused on learning how to use a variety of Tim Holtz products to make a three dimensional collage. We played a lot with distress crayons and distress collage mediums and used ideology ephemera, letter press and found relatives. I absolutely adore the collage I created. It features my one little word for 2016 and focuses on the idea of growing from a willful child to a brave woman. I meant to feature my current age (55) but that didn't really pan out. I did however include the year of my birth (1961) and the year I graduated from high school (1978). 

I love Tim Holtz and use his products a lot (you can see many of my Tim Holtz creations, as well as class and book reviews by clicking and scrolling through this link). I first met Tim almost 15 years ago, when he was first starting out, at a Club Scrap retreat. He spent the entire weekend with the group and showed himself to be a funny, talented, genuine, generous person. And he's still the same, as well as a very gifted teacher. Tim is a self-taught, hands-on artist who began his career as a demonstrator at some chain craft store, so he's not long on design principles. He's also a brilliant business person and inventor who works with a variety of different manufacturers to try to get the highest quality product at a reasonable price. So he makes stamps with stampers anonymous, cutting tools with tonic, ink products with ranger, etc., rather than doing everything with one company.
The class reflected all this. The class was short on collage design theory but long on fun and other learning. This worked for me because I've taken (and taught) collage classes. I learned all about distress crayons (which I had sampled before but not really understood until this class). I also learned an amazing new tip - place your paint and glue/medium brushes in a baby wipe while you're using them to keep them fresh without becoming water logged. For our $85, we got three hours of amazing, personalized instruction, all the supplies for the project, a bonus apron and a bonus stand for our canvases! A huge value in my opinion.

One of the joys of Tim's classes is that he brings everything! I walked in with absolutely no supplies and was able to complete a project that I loved. Another joy is running into friends. Cindy McCool (pictured above) lives near me and we used to get together at least once a month to make art together. We'd lost track of each other recently, so it was quite a treat to walk into the classroom and spy her there! Although we were not sitting anywhere near each other and there was a huge variety of supplies to choose from, there ended up being a lot of similarities between our two projects. I guess that's what comes from being art sisters who have spent so much time together.
All-in-all, a terrific class and a terrific day!