Objects as portraits: Still life oil painting summer school
- Monday, 20 July 2026
- Tuesday, 21 July 2026
- Wednesday, 22 July 2026
Enrol
| Standard: | £540 |
| Concessions: | £486 |
Please book a ticket to attend this course which will take place in the Roden Centre for Creative Learning.
Tickets include entry to the National Gallery. Please arrive in good time to access the building and find the event.
Bookings close 10 minutes before the event begins.
Concessions are for full-time students, jobseekers, and disabled adults.
About
Still life painting has long been a way for artists to think deeply about and capture the world around them through objects. From devotional images of simple vessels to abundant displays of fruit and flowers and expressive abstract compositions, still-life paintings can act as portraits: of people, beliefs, politics, wealth and ways of seeing.
In this three-day summer school, you’ll explore how still life painting has evolved over time, and how objects can carry meaning. Working in dialogue with the National Gallery’s exhibition on Francisco de Zurbarán, we’ll study 17th-century Spanish and Dutch still-life paintings alongside later developments in modern painting, including the work of Paul Cezanne.
Across three studio days, you’ll work from carefully constructed still-life arrangements, developing oil paintings that move from close observation to more personal interpretation. Through guided looking in the Gallery and sustained studio practice, the course invites you to consider how still lives can function not just as depictions of objects, but as portraits shaped by time, touch and personality.
This summer school is suitable for artists of all levels. All materials are provided, and your works are yours to take home. Handouts with extra resources will be provided in advance of the sessions.
Objects as portraits: Still life painting summer school
We begin by exploring still life as a form of quiet attention and presence. Taking inspiration from Zurbarán’s restrained and devotional depictions of everyday objects, you’ll work from simple arrangements that emphasise form, proportion and spatial relationships.
Through close looking in the Gallery and sustained painting in the studio, the focus will be on how objects are placed, isolated and given weight within the composition. You’ll consider how restraint, stillness and clarity can allow objects to take on a powerful sense of presence, and how early still-life paintings often functioned as meditations on faith, labour and contemplation.
Objects as portraits: Still life painting summer school
The second day turns to considering surface, reflection, and complexity. Looking at 17th-century Dutch still lifes, including the exquisite flower paintings of Rachel Ruysch, we’ll explore how artists used detail, texture and abundance to convey time, growth, decay and desire.
Working from more complex arrangements, you’ll experiment with layering, colour relationships and surface handling to capture variety and density. This session encourages close observation of materials, glass, skin, petals, fabric, and asks how abundance can function as a portrait of a culture, a moment or a way of living.
Objects as portraits: Still life painting summer school
On the final day, we move towards modern approaches to still life, focusing on how artists such as Paul Cézanne transformed objects into structures of colour, rhythm and perception.
Building on the previous days, you’ll be encouraged to simplify, rework and reinterpret your still-life paintings, considering how objects can be used to explore balance, repetition and painterly process. This session emphasises personal response and compositional decision-making, allowing your still life paintings to move beyond description and become portraits shaped by your own way of seeing.
Your tutor
Adele Wagstaff trained at Newcastle University and the Slade School of Fine Art where she focused on working from the nude in sustained poses. Her practice continues to explore the human figure, anatomy and portraiture through drawing and painting. She has been shortlisted for the Jerwood Drawing Prize and the BP Portrait Award, and her work has been exhibited in the National Portrait Gallery, Royal West of England Academy, Royal Society of Portrait Painters and the Canadian Portrait Academy. Adele is an experienced tutor, who has taught at the Royal Academy, as well as the Slade School of Fine Art, Art Academy London and Pallant House Gallery, and she has written two books: 'Still Life Painting in Oils' (2012) and 'Painting the Nude' (2015), both published by the Crowood Press.