Great Books | Delightful Art Co

In this live, online art class, students learn the fundamentals of art and design while they do graphic design, illustration, logo design, painting, and drawing projects.
Inspiration comes from "Out of the Silent Planet," "Lord of the Rings," in the first semester and Shakespeare characters, and the "Odyssey" in the spring semester.

Meets weekly for an hour and a half

14 weeks per semester

Regular Prices:

$349 per semester*

$619 for the full year*

*These prices include the registration fee.

Registration fee is non-refundable. See FAQ for refund policy.

Class Calendar:

Fall Semester begins the week of Aug. 26.

Fall Break: the week of Oct. 14

Last day of Fall semester is the week of Dec. 9

Spring Semester begins the week of Jan. 13

Spring Break the week of Mar.10

Last week of class: the week of Apr. 21

Click the red button below to register:

You do not need to have had an art class before taking this class. Drawing and painting skills will be covered.

All classes are recorded, so if you miss a class, you can watch the recording later.

Learn new drawing and painting skills each week and begin to develop original compositions. We will discuss where new ideas come from and learn methods for generating new ideas. Students discuss their ideas and creativity becomes contagious. These classes tend to be more relational with more time for students to talk and they have more opportunities to try their own thing and see where it leads them. We often combine art history with pop culture to create fun new paintings. We create landscapes, still life, and portraits and introduce graphic design projects like album covers, expressive typography, and book design using traditional methods (painting, drawing, and cut paper). Students may use software to create their art in this class.

The book, "Imaginative Realism" will be our guide for creating fantasy characters. Purchasing the book is optional. I recommend it for students who have a real passion for drawing fantasy characters and settings.

The book, "Graphic Design Fundamentals" is recommended for students who are particularly interested in graphic design. It is optional reading.

"Design" is solving problems with art.

ALL CLASSES ARE RECORDED SO YOU CAN WATCH LATER IF YOU MISS A CLASSNote: tuition is per student. If siblings take the class, they both pay tuition.

This course alternates every year between GREAT BOOKS and GREAT ADVENTURES

2024-25 will be Great Books . 2025-26 school year will be Great Adventures,

This is one of my favorite classes to teach. I love seeing students find their own voice and express themselves. Projects are loosely defined and students can modify the project so they do it their own way or their own style.

I also love the classes that students lead, I get to try new things, too!

This class is a great complement to Challenge III and/or Challenge IV.

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Skills:

Fine arts skills:

Landscapes, still lifes, portraits and sculpture.

Design skills:

Typography, album covers, book covers, and illustration (If students want to use Illustrator they can. The design book above will get them started.)

We explore where new ideas come from and learn ideation methods

Student Take Overs:

students have the opportunity to lead a class in the second semester.

Themes:

The theme for this class changes each year because students often take this class for two or three years.

2024-25 will be GREAT BOOKS: Creating Art inspired by Out of the Silent Planet, Select Shakespeare Characters and Scenes, and the Odyssey

2025-26 will be GREAT ADVENTURES: Art Around the World

We will learn about the culture, art, and religion of each country/continent and create fine art and graphic design projects inspired by that area. Focus will be on non-Western art and religions.

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We'll learn about expressive typography and discuss how images and typography can work together. Students will create design projects such as posters, album covers, and product packaging. These samples are from Advanced Art and Design when the theme was "Great Books."

2025-26 SCHOOL YEAR THEME: GREAT ADVENTURES

First semester, we'll follow the route of Marco Polo from Italy to Israel, to the Middle East to China.

Second semester: Japan, Australia, South America, then Africa.

The last 5 weeks are available for students to lead a class. (Leading a class qualifies this course to be given HONORS credit. It is optional. Students who want to make this an honors class will choose a date and work with the instructor to develop and lead one hour and a half class.)

We'll generally spend 3 weeks on each country.

I'll show a slide show on the art, culture, and religion of that country and students will do a fine art project inspired by that country's art.

Students take the art from the previous week and use it to inspire a graphic design.

(For the graphic design project, students can do hand lettering or use Canva or Illustrator.)

Optional Readings:

The Baker Pocket Guide to World Religions: What Every Christian Needs to Know by Gerald R. McDermott. (link at right)

Graphic Design Fundamentals: An Introduction & Workbook for Beginners by Kris Taft Miller (Includes an introduction to Adobe Illustrator if you are interested in that, I can answer questions related to Illustrator at the end of class.)

Your syllabus will have reading assignments from these 2 books if you want to add on one or both books.