Lines of Desire 1368 8x8" Oil/cold wax on panel © 2013 Janice Mason Steeves July was a busy month of teaching Abstract Painting with cold wax and oil workshops: a 5-day workshop at Metchosin International Summer School of the Arts on Vancouver Island, a 3-day workshop in Vancouver and then another 5-day workshop at the Haliburton School of the Arts in Ontario. While I teach the technique of working with cold wax with oil, my workshops are about painting. I try to make the structure of my workshops very simple and clear. It's a step-by-step process, each day building toward the next day. Five-day workshops add a slowness to the pace that is difficult to create in a 3-day workshop. It takes a couple of days for students to settle into the process-learning a new technique and then letting go of expectations that a painting should be produced in the first two days. I think that one of the most important messages I was ...