Cost: $245 | Member Pricing: $180–220
Instructor: Michael Azgour
▶ Instructor: Michael Azgour, MFA | Portfolio
▶ 12 Participants Maximum
▶ In-Person and Remote Participation
COST: $245
MEMBER PRICING | Use code at checkout
$220 – Member | use code: MEMBER
$198 – Advancing Plan | use code: ADVANCING
$180 – Mastering Plan | use code: MASTERING
FINANCIAL ASSISTANCE
We want everyone to be able to participate. If you need financial assistance, a 30% discount is available – just email us at team@azgourartgroup.com
WORKSHOP OVERVIEW
Join us at the West Portal Gallery in San Francisco for a dynamic, hands-on painting workshop designed to spark creativity, strengthen compositional instincts, and expand your visual language. This immersive five-hour session blends lecture, demonstration, guided painting time, and a supportive group critique – all in a small group setting limited to 12 participants.
Beyond the Reference: Transforming Images into Contemporary Painting
A five-hour immersive workshop for artists who want to work more freely and inventively from photographs, drawings, and other source imagery.
Reference images can provide valuable structure, information, and inspiration, but they can also limit a painting when followed too literally. In this workshop, you’ll explore practical strategies for transforming source material into paintings that reflect your own visual language, ideas, and creative instincts.
Through guided exercises, discussion, and hands-on experimentation, you’ll learn to:
Select, crop, combine, and reinterpret reference images
Identify the essential shapes, structures, and visual relationships within an image
Move between representation and abstraction with greater confidence
Alter color, scale, space, edges, and composition to strengthen a painting
Simplify, exaggerate, obscure, or disrupt imagery to create greater visual interest
Use intuition and improvisation while maintaining a strong compositional foundation
Develop paintings that feel independent from their original source material
This focused, intensive session combines practical studio work with thoughtful discussion about how artists use imagery. Participants will leave with new paintings in progress, a broader range of approaches to working from references, and practical tools for developing a more personal and contemporary visual language.
Instructor Michael Azgour will use his own paintings to demonstrate key techniques – primarily in acrylic or oil – and guide each participant individually throughout the session. Artists are free to use any medium of their choice.
WHAT TO EXPECT
Instructor lecture and painting demonstration
Structured painting exercises with room for interpretation
Individualized guidance during studio work
Group critique and discussion
Insights into the instructor’s current projects as added educational context
A casual, energetic environment that encourages experimentation and growth
MATERIALS TO BRING
Painting materials: oils, acrylics, watercolor, or preferred media
1-2 painting surfaces toned with warm grounds (any size)
Drawing paper and drawing tools
Reference materials: multiple photographs or drawings to use as inspiration
Tables and chairs are provided. Participants may bring their own easels (tabletop or freestanding) or work directly on the table. The studio offers a restroom, paint-washing sink, paper towels, water, tea, and backup art supplies if you forget something. A café is conveniently located across the street, though bringing lunch is recommended to maximize working time.
ADDITIONAL DETAILS
Arrival: Participants are welcome to arrive up to 20 minutes early to settle in.
Parking: Free parking is available around Wawona & 14th Street. There is a 2-hour limit on weekdays and no time limit for weekends (see map below). Directly in front of the studio you will find meter parking, which is ideal for loading and unloading. There’s a good cafe right across the street and several lunch spots in the area in case you need to refuel.
Questions: please get in touch via email: team@westportalgallery.com
WEST PORTAL GALLERY
320 West Portal Gallery | San Francisco, CA 94127
415 212 9092 | team@westportalgallery.com
