Saturday and Sunday, 9 a.m. - 4 p.m.
Instructor: RA Friedman
Weekend Workshop 

This intensive workshop is designed for those looking to push their portrait drawing abilities toward the professional level. Demonstrations and in-class exercises will open up how you see, think, and approach the creation of a likeness, avoiding common pitfalls. Explore subtleties of form and the relationships of lines, planes and tones, capturing the character and energy of the subject. Additionally, instruction will cover facial expressions and deep anatomy of the face, neck, and upper body. Drawing will be primarily in graphite pencil and stick. Introductory portrait drawing or equivalent recommended. Note: Tuition includes a $10 models fee.

Image: RA Friedman

Register by: December 1
Materials List
Fall 2025 CE Policy Guide, including withdrawal/refund policies  

Mondays, 8:30 AM - 11:30 AM  
Instructor: Deon Robinson  
Fifteen-Week Extended Studio Course (45 Hours)  
Note: No class on Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, January 19, or during Spring Break, March 2 – 8. 

PAFA’s Extended Studio Courses offer fifteen-weeks of comprehensive instruction taught by PAFA's core faculty for an immersive fine arts experience. PAFA's selection of Continuing Education traditional-length and short courses will be coming soon! 

With a focus on telling stories utilizing artwork, this course explores the juxtaposition of word and image, sequentially, and other narrative tools to convey visual meaning. Participants will complete several visual narratives within a variety of formats, which may include a series of related images, a comic book, picture book, graphic novel, or other illustrated narrative. Course Modality: in-person. 

Image: Deon Robinson

Register by: January 2  
Materials will be addressed via PAFA’s Canvas online platform (if applicable) or on the first day of class.  
Please review the CE Winter/Spring Policy Guide, including withdrawal/refund policies  
Notes: Extended Studio Courses are not eligible for PAFA membership or promotional discounts. A minimum 10% fee applies to withdrawals, including same-day – students are advised to confirm their schedules before registering. 

Mondays, 1:00 PM - 4:00 PM  
Instructor: Deon Robinson  
Fifteen-Week Extended Studio Course (45 Hours)  
Note: No class on Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, January 19, or during Spring Break, March 2 – 8. 

PAFA’s Extended Studio Courses offer fifteen-weeks of comprehensive instruction taught by PAFA's core faculty for an immersive fine arts experience. PAFA's selection of Continuing Education traditional-length and short courses will be coming soon! 

This course offers a survey of illustration in both function and practical application. Students will learn to analyze and visually interpret written source material while exploring a variety of ideation methods and experimenting with techniques combining traditional and digital media. Key projects will include illustrations for editorials, advertising, product packaging, picture books, and lifestyle applications. Students not pursuing a focus in illustration but interested in visual communication are encouraged to join this class. Course Modality: in-person.

Image: Deon Robinson 

Register by: January 2  
Materials will be addressed via PAFA’s Canvas online platform (if applicable) or on the first day of class.  
Please review the CE Winter/Spring Policy Guide, including withdrawal/refund policies  
Notes: Extended Studio Courses are not eligible for PAFA membership or promotional discounts. A minimum 10% fee applies to withdrawals, including same-day – students are advised to confirm their schedules before registering. 

Tuesdays, 8:30 AM - 11:30 AM
Instructor: Steve Nocella  
Fifteen-Week Extended Studio Course (45 Hours)  
Note: No class during Spring Break, March 2 – 8.

PAFA’s Extended Studio Courses offer fifteen-weeksof comprehensive instruction taught by PAFA's core faculty for an immersive fine arts experience. PAFA's selection of Continuing Education traditional-length and short courseswill be coming soon!

In this class, students will apply principles of drawing to invented images, both representational and abstract. Students will draw from the imagination without live, physical reference using a variety of approaches that may include using photo and found reference, narrative drawing (single and multi-panel), creating visual solutions to a brief, and constraint-based abstraction. 

Image: Chaim Gross, Sketch for Sculpture, 1980, Pen and ink, graphite and sepia wash on off-white wove paper, 12 1/2 x 17 13/16 in. Courtesy of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia, Gift of the artist, 1985.59 

Register by:January 2 
Materials will be addressed via PAFA’s Canvas online platform (if applicable) or on the first day of class.
Please review the CE Winter/SpringPolicy Guide, including withdrawal/refund policies
Notes: Extended Studio Courses are not eligible for PAFA membership or promotional discounts. A minimum 10% fee applies to withdrawals, including same-day – students are advised to confirm their schedules before registering.

Tuesdays, 1:00 PM - 4:00 PM 
Instructor: Jill A. Rupinski 
Fifteen-Week Extended Studio Course (45 Hours) 
Note: No class during Spring Break, March 2 – 8. 

PAFA’s Extended Studio Courses offer fifteen-weeks of comprehensive instruction taught by PAFA's core faculty for an immersive fine arts experience. PAFA's selection of Continuing Education traditional-length and short courses will be coming soon! 

This course will provide hands-on experience using traditional dry media, such as graphite, colored pencils, chalk, and pastel, through water-soluble materials, such as watercolor, gouache and ink. There will be ample presentation, lecture, and demonstration of the wet/dry media techniques. Students will be guided in working from personal sketches, paintings, photography, and from recognized artworks as well as from observation. Students will be expected to provide basic materials that they already have and most paper. To ensure that all students can experience the various processes, the instructor will provide any materials that individual students do not have. Issues of form, spatial concepts, color, visual and critical thinking will be addressed through individual and group critiques. Course Modality: in-person. 

Image: Jill A. Rupinski 

Register by: January 2  
Materials will be addressed via PAFA’s Canvas online platform (if applicable) or on the first day of class.  
Please review the CE Winter/Spring Policy Guide, including withdrawal/refund policies  
Notes: Extended Studio Courses are not eligible for PAFA membership or promotional discounts. A minimum 10% fee applies to withdrawals, including same-day – students are advised to confirm their schedules before registering. 

Fridays, 8:30 AM - 11:30 AM*  
Instructor: Peter Van Dyck  
Fifteen-Week Extended Studio Course (45 – 90 Hours)  
Note: No class during Spring Break, March 2 – 8. 

PAFA’s Extended Studio Courses offer fifteen-weeks of comprehensive instruction taught by PAFA's core faculty for an immersive fine arts experience. PAFA's selection of Continuing Education traditional-length and short courses will be coming soon! 

This class is an opportunity for the student to develop three complex works of escalating ambition. As has often been said, “all art comes from other art” in the sense that artmaking is a culture in continuous negotiation with present needs and precedent. Students will develop a small group of imaginative peers from the labyrinth of painting history to consult and debate in the development of three works. The resulting pictures may include the production of studies, copies, collages, and any other kind of visual fodder to develop ambitious compositions that will explore the overlapping terrains of abstraction and figuration. What is meant here is that Piero, de Stael, Gorky, Ingres, Mary Cassatt, and Kerry James Marshall are fraternal and in solidarity about the demands of painting. Course Modality: in-person. 

*Optional: This course is also available for full-day attendance (morning, 8:30 - 11:30 a.m., and afternoon, 1 - 4 p.m.) for $2,800. Select length with tuition adjustment during checkout. 

Image: Peter Van Dyck 

Register by: January 2  
Materials will be addressed via PAFA’s Canvas online platform (if applicable) or on the first day of class. 
Please review CE Winter/Spring Policy Guide, including withdrawal/refund policies  
Notes: Extended Studio Courses are not eligible for PAFA membership or promotional discounts. A minimum 10% fee applies to withdrawals, including same-day – students are advised to confirm their schedules before registering. 

Tuesdays, 9 a.m. - 12 p.m. 
Instructor: John Horn 
Twelve-Week Course (36 Hours) 
Note: No class during Spring Break, March 2 - 8.

Register by December 15 for a 10% Early Bird Discount! Enter promo code EARLYBIRDSPRING2026 at checkout (and click “+” to add the discount). PAFA members at the Friend level and above receive an additional 10% off. Discount applies to CE regular adult Winter/Spring classes and workshops only. Fall 2025 courses, studio rental programs, Fifteen-Week Extended Studio Courses (special programs), gift certificates, membership purchases, and lockers are ineligible.

Strengthen and hone your foundational drawing skills through a series of one- and two-day projects. Topics of concern will be design, structure of space, perspective, and light and shade. Subjects will include interior space, single objects and still life arrangements, and the life model. All levels from beginner to advanced are welcome. Tuition includes a $25 models fee.

Image: John Horn

Register by: January 13 
Materials List - Coming Soon  
Please review CE's Winter/Spring 2026 Policy Guide, including withdrawal/refund policies, prior to registering.

Tuesdays, 12:30 - 3:30 p.m. 
Instructor: Phyllis Laver 
Six-Week Short Course (18 Hours) 

Register by December 15 for a 10% Early Bird Discount! Enter promo code EARLYBIRDSPRING2026 at checkout (and click “+” to add the discount). PAFA members at the Friend level and above receive an additional 10% off. Discount applies to CE regular adult Winter/Spring classes and workshops only. Fall 2025 courses, studio rental programs, Fifteen-Week Extended Studio Courses (special programs), gift certificates, membership purchases, and lockers are ineligible.

PAFA’s breathtaking Cast Hall is back for Spring 2026! Following renovations to PAFA's Historic Landmark Building, this unique resource is again available to offer enrolled students opportunities to work from copies of Greco-Roman and Renaissance sculpture, including the Winged Victory, the Venus de Milo, and the staggering life-size Michelangelo’s David, among other notable works. Students may also work from select casts on display in additional PAFA exhibition areas. Cast Drawing was one of the first courses established in the founding of the Academy and has remained a core part of PAFA’s fine arts curriculum for over 200 years. Become a part of this long and rich artistic tradition as you learn to draw accurately from observation, explore line and shape, describe form through light and shadow, and gain an appreciation for some of history’s most beautiful sculptural artworks. This course is an excellent introduction to drawing techniques and materials and is appropriate to all levels.

Read a History of PAFA’s Cast Hall by Faculty Member Al Gury here.

Image: Daniel Garber, [Cast drawing: female torso (4th century, Greece)] (detail), ca. 1899-1905, charcoal on cream paper, 24 1/4 x 18 3/4 in. Collection of the PAFA Museum. Accession # 1945.14.4. Gift of the artist.  

Register by: January 13 
Materials List - Coming Soon 
Please review CE's Winter/Spring 2026 Policy Guide, including withdrawal/refund policies, prior to registering.