Collection: Daytime Courses

Develop and refine your painting skills in abstraction using acrylics through the exploration of artistic techniques including style, colour and composition, resulting in visually inspiring, abstract works that are developed out of engagement with representational imagery. 

Enhance your throwing skills to create larger, more intricate forms on the potter’s wheel and expand your existing throwing techniques. Explore new methods, including advanced coiling and the complexities of sectional throwing, to create tall forms and low, wide pieces. 

This beginner course introduces the essentials of oil and acrylic painting through direct observation. Explore light, colour, and form in still life, landscapes, and portraits while learning composition, proportion, perspective, colour theory, and technique. Progress from monochrome studies to full colour works, building confidence and foundational painting skills. 

Engage your five senses in the act of drawing and experience a fresh, personal and perceptive approach to art making. From initial idea generation to the creation of resolved drawings, this course provides a pathway to dynamic and personal expression.

Learn to paint expressively with an individual approach while increasing your knowledge and understanding of the importance of colour, composition and form. Using acrylic or oil paint, students will learn how to mix and experiment with colour and will be encouraged to paint quickly and loosely and to develop expressive brushwork.

Immerse yourself in the luminous world of watercolour and explore the expressive potential of the medium, working across landscapes, still life, and the human figure. With demonstrations, hands-on exercises, and discussions, this course encourages you to refine your technique while embracing spontaneity.

Explore contemporary landscape painting through a balance of outdoor drawing and indoor painting practice. On location you’ll make sketches that capture shifting light, colour, and atmosphere. In the NAS studio, you’ll experiment, reflect, and transform these studies into painted works, developing confidence through spontaneous observation and thoughtful refinement.

Develop and deepen your practice of hand-building in ceramics, whether you're interested in creating vessels, figurative forms, abstract sculptures, large-scale works, or a series of smaller pieces. Ideal for both beginners and intermediate students seeking to expand their skills. 

Curious about drawing but unsure where to start? This course is designed for beginners and those wanting to refresh their skills, offering an entry point into the fundamentals of drawing. Practical exercises will introduce you to the expressive possibilities of different media, including graphite and charcoal. 

Learn to see beyond the bewildering details of your subject to gather the colour information you need to get your painting off to a great start! Discover how to think of colour in a way that enables you to mix the exact colour that you want confidently and directly, every time. The course assumes no prior knowledge and has given great results with students from beginner to advanced levels.

Learn basic anatomical concepts that will enable you to grasp the essential structure and action of the figure in a few lines, leaving you free to focus on the individual character and expressive effect of your drawing, instead of struggling just to make it look like a figure!  A life model poses in each session, alternating with group and individual instructions and demonstrations referring to the model, skeleton, anatomical diagrams and master drawings.

Join a comprehensive, foundation course in figure drawing to develop your technical skills and gain confidence in capturing the human form in dynamic poses in the drawing studio and in real-world environments. 

This exciting course combines textiles with creative drawing using diverse techniques with paper, fabric, collage and assemblage. In this course you will explore the materiality of different surfaces.  Students will be guided in sketching, painting, weaving and embroidering lines on the surface of papers and textiles.

Enrol in an immersive and dynamic workshop that explores three-dimensional slab construction with terracotta clay. The emphasis is on developing experimental slab forms with an orientation towards vessel structures. An extensive variety of in-depth surface embellishment techniques will be explored.

Explore a range of monoprint, papermaking and bookmaking techniques; transforming existing papers into surfaces for drawing, painting, printing and collage to create artists’ books; incorporate various materials to reimagine and repurpose visual ideas.   

Learn fundamental welding skills and complete small-scale welded steel sculptures. With demonstrations and techniques for using arc and MIG welders and oxyacetylene to cut, shape and bend steel, as well as ways to grind steel and use surface treatments suited to steel.

Expand your still life painting skills in an immersive weekend with renowned artist Jude Rae, who shares her insights into the genre within a cultural frame that supports both the traditions of realist painting and Abstraction. Through personalised instruction you’ll develop a personal visual language to create dynamic, engaging paintings. 

Intermediate to advanced painters will develop their technical skill and studio practice through structured projects and critical discussions. Refine your oil and acrylic techniques, explore supports, colour theory, glazing and mediums, while engaging with traditional genres, historical examples, and group critiques to strengthen your artistic confidence. 

Immerse yourself in the luminous world of watercolour and explore the expressive potential of the medium, working across landscapes, still life, and the human figure. With demonstrations, hands-on exercises, and discussions, this course encourages you to refine your technique while embracing spontaneity.

This course presents a unique approach to understanding and applying colour developed by David over the last 25 years. It consists of eight beautifully illustrated lectures complemented by optional practical exercises that progress from mastering colour control in paint through to still-life painting studies. The live lectures and discussions can be viewed outside class as video recordings. Students undertake practical exercises outside class and can submit photos for feedback.