In the course of a holiday in Tuscany, you have the possibility to gather hundreds of images. You won't use a camera or a video camera; instead with Mike you will create special itineraries, putting yourself in front of monuments, people, landscapes, even a dog...and then draw them. You won't have simply a guide, but an instructor who will give you new tools.
Info & Booking
Part of the program "The Other Tuscany", to explore explore the "invisible" Tuscany that few tourists, and many native Italians, see.
The program:
Starting from Piazza Santissima Annunziata, with its Hospital of the Innocents loggia, we will continue toward Piazza del Duomo with Giotto's bell tower and Brunelleschi's Dome, then arriving in Piazza della Signoria with the Loggia dei Lanzi , the Uffizi Gallery and David's marble figure.
Duration: 3 hours, from 10am to 1pm or 2pm to 5pm, with the possibility (not included) of enjoying a delicious Tuscan lunch at Trattoria Le Mossacce in Via del Proconsolo.
You can get to the piazza on foot, or meet your instructor directly at your hotel.
Cost includes Mike’s teaching, an instruction manual, a special kit of drawing and watercolor painting materials, including a Moleskine watercolor sketchbook
Cancellation policy: 100% refund for cancellations at least 15 days before the tour; 50% refund from 14 to 2 days before the tour; no refund for further cancellations and no shows.
Sketching in Florence
The idea
How many times has each of us seen a scene, a person, an event, and thought: "I would like to draw that, to make others see and understand the beauty and uniqueness of that image". Usually we use words, but with Mike we can learn to use our hands, with a sheet of paper and a pencil. In the course of a holiday in Tuscany, we have the possibility to gather hundreds of these images. We won't use a camera or a video camera; instead with Mike we will create special itineraries, putting ourselves in front of monuments, people, landscapes, even a dog...and then draw them. We won't have simply a guide, but an instructor who will give us new tools.
The instructor
Mike began his drawing studies in the early 1980’s at Brandes Art Institute, in Los Angeles, California. Several years later he began working in the animation industry, initially small studios including Morgan Interactive and Colossal Pictures in San Francisco, and Philips Interactive in Los Angeles. His career in feature animation began at Walt Disney Feature Animation in 1994, where he worked on six feature films including Pocahontas, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Hercules, Fantasia 2000, Tarzan, and Beauty and the Beast. He then worked at Walt Disney Animation Australia, and in Valencia, Spain as a supervisor on the animated film El Cid: The Legend. Mike’s teaching career began while working at the Disney studio in Los Angeles, when he taught animation at the American Animation Institute, and at CalArts. In 2004 he became a faculty instructor at the Art Institutes of California, teaching life drawing, animation, sculpture for animation, and character design, and also taught animal drawing at The San Diego Zoo. Since 2005 Mike has been a guest lecturer at many world-class museums, including The Getty Center Museum, The Getty Villa, The Huntington Library and Art Collections, and The Norton Simon Museum of Art, in Los Angeles, and now at Palazzo Strozzi in Florence. He also teaches at several American Universities, including New York University and Syracuse University in Florence.