Do you want to paint expressive, design-driven still life paintings — without getting stuck trying to make everything look “right”?

This class is the foundation for my Still Life Unleashed series, where these ideas are carried into full still life painting projects in upcoming classes in this series. Here, we focus on the design thinking that makes your paintings feel freer, more confident, and more original. We’ll step away from painting and work in a sketchbook, using simple shapes to explore the key ideas that drive every strong composition:
placement, relationships, hierarchy, intent, and inspiration.

In Designing Still Life: Freedom, Confidence, and Choice, you’ll learn how to approach still life as a creative design process instead of a technical problem to solve.

This is a design-first class focused on helping you loosen habits, build confidence, and shift away from perfectionism. Instead of worrying about realism, perspective, or accuracy, you’ll learn how to make intentional choices that lead to more expressive, modern still life art.

Through artist examples and guided sketching exercises, you’ll begin to see how these decisions shape a painting — and how trusting your choices leads to more freedom and enjoyment in your creative process.

What You’ll Learn:

• How to use placement to build the foundation and structure of a still life
• How to create strong relationships between shapes through spacing, overlap, and grouping
• How to use hierarchy to guide the viewer’s eye and create clear focus
• How to apply intent to simplify, flatten, or adjust reality in your compositions
• How to use inspiration to generate ideas without copying reference material
• How to approach still life painting as a design process, not a copying exercise
• How to build confidence and trust your creative decisions

Who This Class Is For:

Perfect for beginners and intermediate artists who want to:

• Learn still life painting in a more modern, expressive way
• Loosen up and move away from rigid, “correct” drawing and painting
• Build confidence before starting a finished painting
• Develop a more intuitive, creative art process

If you’re ready to think differently about still life painting and build a strong foundation for expressive, original artwork, this class is for you.

Additional Resources:

Download the Class Resources

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You can download the class resources here.

Susan Macy

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