Welcome

Renewing the Renaissance™ (RTR)’s Beginner’s School was created to allow an individual anywhere in the world to learn online the basics of drawing, painting, and sculpting—for free, no registration required. The internet is filled with numerous painting and drawing videos that assume an introductory understanding of art that most people don’t have. We have designed each course of the Beginner’s School to teach students starting from the very basics up to the point where they can comfortably use videos and advice to further their own development. The Beginner’s School provides a comfortable venue for seniors to help maintain their cognitive skills through art, for young students to foster their creativity, and for parents to introduce art to their children and grandchildren. For those who want a quick video tour of the website, click here (and use the Closed Captions feature if you want!).

Each course—drawing, painting, and sculpture—consists of a series of lessons that includes subject matter text, artist videos (with edited closed captions), and video commentary to guide the student. The lessons include exercises we’ve tried to keep to about an hour, making it easy to fit conveniently into a busy life. Google Translate allows the student to translate the text, videos, supply recommendation lists, and budgets into the student’s spoken language (see here for information regarding translation limitations).

You can view the lessons for each course by clicking on the course title you’re interested in on the Course Topic Summaries under Home. Going beyond “how-to,” lessons include topics such as the tools required and their cost, and what to consider in choosing a workspace or studio, all supported by brief art history lessons. We have a lesson, Being A Successful Student, that will help you do just that…and our FAQs are organized to give you the answers quickly to your general questions. Check out our lesson Choosing Your First Course for a quick guide on getting started.

The first Renaissance was a cultural movement that spanned the 14th to the 16th centuries, beginning in Florence, Italy in the late Middle Ages and later spreading to the rest of Europe.  As a cultural movement, it encompassed a flowering of literature, science, art, religion, and politics. It is perhaps best known for its artistic developments and the contributions of such multi-talented artists as Leonardo de Vinci and Michelangelo. Artists during the Renaissance learned from older, Master artists in the Master’s studio or Atelier (ah-tell-YAY). Some Ateliers would have many young artists learning from and helping out the Master, and students influenced and helped each other as well.

It’s this sort of artistic community we want to recreate here at RTR’s Beginner’s School and connect artists all over the world. We want students to submit and share their work using our submission form and encourage each other in their artistic journeys by contributing to the student galleries (see an example here). Students can also communicate with each other by posting in the Leave A Comment section of each lesson, like the one below, and also by using Instagram to post images of their work (tag us! @beginnersschool). We appreciate all the positive testimonials we’ve been receiving on our courses–check out what people are saying about us. 

The Student Resource Center (SRC) is another place for artists to share. As a searchable database, the SRC allows experienced artists to submit their tips and techniques to guide the next beginning student along. The SRC also includes ideas such as how to flourish by getting your creativity unstuck, and nourish yourself to be a healthy student artist.

We believe supporting art is important for the world’s future, and that it’s important to ‘give back’. At Renewing the Renaissance, we strive to work with adult artists with challenges (such as high functioning autism, language and social impediments, and executive functioning disorders) to help their art careers. Take a look at the work of our talented painters and sculptors on our sister website www.RenewingTheRenaissance.com. Consider commissioning a painting (an interesting creative experience!), or acquiring their artwork.

Thanks to all for embracing the Beginner’s School spirit of the Renaissance!

Key Developers

Ashleigh Norman, MFA SFAI The ‘right brain’ developer and lead writer of lessons.

Phil Shemanski, CPA MS (Tax) The ‘left brain’ developer and Beginner’s School founder.

Video Artists

Drawing: Sarah Ammons

Watercolor: Christine Oliver

Oil: Cynda Valle

Sculpture: Kent Kidwell

Acrylic: Will Kemp & Will Kemp Art School

Contributing Artists

A really big thank you to the all the artists–living and dead–who have contributed to great vastness of art history and contemporary art. You inspire us to create our own art and to see the beauty in even the most banal. Thank you.

Renewing the Renaissance artists, without whom this site would never have been born. Thank you for your patience and support throughout this process and for continuing to create and share your artwork with the world.

Videographers & Support Staff

Shawn Darling Mike Mahoney Bryn Robertson

Tim Erskin, KMVT Rene Mendoza, KMVT Bobby Chastain, KMVT Shelley Wolfe, KMVT

Website Creation, Advice, and Testing

Sarah Ammons	Kaaren Marquez
Ryan Carr	Oscar Ramirez
Mabisa Chhetry	Jason M Rhodes
Cesar Karamazov	Fernanda Rodriguez
Jay Mandyam	Onur Yildiz
Shreyas Mandyam, MMediaWeb	Tom Zephyrs

Our “Village” of Supporters

They say, “it takes a village,” and it couldn’t be more true. Thank you to our village of supporters out there–you’ve been with us through all the paint, sweat, and tears it took to complete the Beginner’s School and we are forever indebted to you. We value your advice, your opinions, your guidance, and most of all your open minds and ears as we’ve worked together to create this. Indiegogo crowdfunders, your contributions significantly impacted our development and we couldn’t have done it without you.

Maneeza Aminy Jahye Aronson Caitlin Becker Gwen Behrstock Janet Cahill David Colvin Laura Corben Steven Crawley Jane Ferguson Susan Fink Geri-Ann Galanti Dee Gibson Jeff Grabow Laurie Green Patricia Herzog Daria Hodapp

Bette Houtchens Claudia A. Howe Carole Hunter Harold Jaffe Nancee Jaffe Karen Jaw-Madson Robert Kalof Laurie Kasparian Karen Kaye Amanda Keating Robert Kranz KHRG Law firm LLP Janet Loeb Christina Ma Amy MacDonald Rahat Marfatia

Lydia Martin Vicki Martin Susan Mielke Linda Naiman John Norman Kim Norman Lynne O’Hara Raymond Osofsky Jennifer Pence John Phelps Safa Rashtchy Bonnie Rickles Richard Sasaki Joan Shemanski Naomi Shemanski Sheri Shemanski

Laura Shumaker Perry Simon Cole Smothers David Spector Michael Teng Mark Tramiel Sanjay Uppal Irma Velasquez Sylvia H White Ellen Whorton Dennis Wilkins Michael Wohler Michelle Wohler Pearl Wolffs Nathan Zebedeo Laurie Zoloth