Painted Space uses the anthroposophic approach to art as its framework, but aims to lead each artistically-striving individual towards the full expression of their own creativity. This creative path then harmonises and strengthens our inner being by tapping into the profound connection between the human spirit and the creative process.

The Schooling course deepens and extends Rudolf Steiner’s guidelines for the future development of the visual arts by asking each participant to become their own research instrument while unfolding their unique creativity.

Rudolf Steiner intended the artistic to be central to the pursuit of the spiritual investigations he named ‘Anthroposophy’, just as he believed creativity to be central to what it means to be human. Yet access to the spiritual is not simply a given today. In our materialistic age, the soul needs awakening to its inmost needs, perhaps far more than we realise. The path to the spiritual needs to be actively cultivated with our whole being, not just our head. The arts play a role here beyond the aesthetic.

An immersive studio environment

A formal art school training is not a viable option for everyone but an online one is. The Studio aims to create the immersive studio environment of an art school on an online platform. Accessible to individuals of all backgrounds, participants set their own weekly rhythm for painting, drawing, contemplation and study and meet together twice a fortnight for review, new content, demonstrations, discussion and questions. In this way, participants can adapt the training to their daily work but still benefit from regularly participating in an international artistic community of like-minded souls.

Online accessibility with flexible options.

• A blend of structured artistic practice, technical skills, anthroposophic theory, personal research, and professional development.

• A combination of pre-recorded technical videos, mini-lectures, fortnightly Zoom meetings, individual mentoring, self-directed home study and workshop intensives. 

Course structure

Art as a Path of Schooling for the Soul is built from individual courses, both Core and Optional. It consists of six individual short courses, chosen from the range of Foundation courses and Advanced courses, four workshop intensives, eight lecture webinars and two individual consultations culminating in a small research project over the two years.

Schedule: The teaching year operates over three terms, usually on a fortnightly cycle from March to December. Dates and times are for the Sydney/Canberra/Melbourne (AEST/AEDT) timezone.

Course requirements for Diploma or PD certificate

A schooling process demands active participation from participants in the form of review, reflection, and general sharing. This is not an instructional course but a research-led schooling for the soul, meaning you are a co-worker in the process.

• Attendance: 75% live attendance is required for the diploma and professional development certificates, unless your time zone makes this impossible. Missed classes must be made up using the recordings and posting the course exercises and reflections on Padlet.
  
  ‘Live attendance‘ means
  • attending live sessions
  • participating in discussion in class
  • post photos of ongoing artwork on Padlet
  • posting reflections on Padlet

Time zone differences: live attendance may be substituted with regular correspondence or Zoom calls if live attendance is impossible due to time zone differences. Please discuss this with the course director before enrolling.

• Recordings: Videos of most sessions are available to all participants as learning tools but are not a substitute for attending classes, unless you live in a timezone that makes live attendance difficult. Then, alternative arrangements can be made in consultation with the course director.

• Ongoing engagement: Course participants are expected to work on the given exercises at home between classes and post photos and comments about their ongoing progress on the course’s digital noticeboard called Padlet.

Total hours: Total of approximately 110 hrs contact hours + 400-600 hrs of self-managed creative work at home over two years. This is approx. 2.5 hours to 3 hours a week in term time.

Mentoring and individual consultations: available to all participants as a standalone. Mentoring sessions can be booked at need and are recommended if taking the self-guided study option.

A Diploma is awarded at the full completion of the course if all above course requirements are met.

Professional Development certificates are also available for individual courses, subject to 75% attendance (including posting all exercises on padlet).

Philosophical Foundations

Methodology: The anthroposophic approach to the visual arts is essentially phenomenological in process: we immerse ourselves in the phenomena of colour, form, line, space, movement or composition, then reflect, repeat, again and again, to come to the essence of the phenomenon. In this way, understanding of theory or philosophical indications arises out of our experience.

Core resources: Goethe’s Theory of Colour, Steiner’s Colour lectures, Steiner’s extensive portfolio of pastels, painting and training sketches, including the Nine Training Sketches, his late watercolours, and his Goetheanum ceiling motifs.

Other texts: Steiner’s Art in the Light of Mystery Wisdom, How to Know Higher Worlds, The Spiritual Foundations of Morality, Macrocosm and Microcosm, Anthroposophy and the Visual Arts; Schwenk’s Sensitive Chaos, Kandinsky’s Concerning the Spiritual in Art. Other texts and resources provided at need.

Feature image: Growing and Withering Plant as Counterimages: a Study, by Fiona Campbell, from the Complementaries and Counterimages: How To Know Higher Worlds course