Dates: 5 days, Thursday – Monday, July 24 – 28, 2025
Time: 10:30 am – ~5:30 pm (with 1 hour lunch break)
Cost & enrollment: non-member price $800. Open to all levels beginner to advanced, 10 students maximum. All payments are non-refundable unless the workshop is cancelled. If you need to drop the class later, we may be able to provide a refund if there’s a student from the waiting list to replace you. This class and the waiting list is now full, contact paul@dogtownsculptors.org to join our e-mail list for future workshops and classes.
Instructor/artist: Tom Durham uses history, literature, narrative, symbols, and mythic metaphors combined with personal experience to conceive and create contemporary figurative sculpture. He has an M.F.A from the University of Minnesota and over 18 years of teaching experience at UCLA, University of Minnesota, College of Charleston, Tulane University, and Academy of Art University (as director of the sculpture program). Tom has received numerous commissions and awards and participated in many exhibitions including the National Sculpture Society Annual and Florence Biennale. Tom’s home studio is in New Orleans.
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Workshop Description: This workshop is open to all levels. We’ll learn various concepts and techniques to model the figure in clay from the life, including gesture, blocking in, proportions, anatomy, and design. We’ll work from a female model in a standing pose at the 18″ scale. Students can sculpt using (1) oil or water clay on a wire armature, or (2) water clay without an armature that can later be fired; Tom will demo both approaches. Teaching methods include lectures, demos, and one on one instruction.
Materials: Students are responsible to bring their own clay (oil or water-based), armature (18″ scale) or wood skewers (if not using an armature), sculpture tools, and other miscellaneous supplies. Use a water-based clay that does not have any sand or grog or an oil-based clay (plastilina/plasticine) of medium hardness (of the three types: soft, medium, firm). If you choose to work in water clay, you can order clay at cost from Paul (paul@dogtownsculptors.org). Full details on materials here.
Dogtown Sculptors 