Registration Now Open!
Join us for “A Year of Wild Nature”!
A Year of Wild Nature is a year-long, immersive mixed media art course exploring the beauty, mystery, diversity and vitality of the natural world. Hosted by renowned artist and author Tamara Laporte from Willowing Arts, and joined by 32 inspiring guest artists, this course invites you to embark on a rich creative adventure. Together, we’ll explore animals, botanicals, landscapes and the wild within, discovering how nature, instinct, symbolism and creative freedom can transform both your artwork and your inner world.
Come journey with us through art,
nature and the wild within.
🌿 🦋 🍄
Reconnect with your inner wildness
All lessons are thoughtfully woven around the many expressions of Wild Nature, giving you a wonderfully varied creative experience throughout the year. You’ll experiment with beautiful mixed media techniques, expressive colour, texture, layers and mark-making while learning from a diverse collection of inspiring artists.
By the end of our year together, you’ll have created a rich collection of nature-inspired artworks while developing new skills, discovering new artists and perhaps deepening your connection with both your creativity and the extraordinary living world around you.
Join A Year of Wild Nature and step into a whole year of art,
exploration, creativity and beautiful wild things. 🌿💛🌿
What is included on this course?
When you join A Year of Wild Nature you will receive:
A wealth of inspiring art classes from an extraordinary collection of professional artists and teachers — an entire creative library for only a fraction of what these classes would cost individually.
Included on this course are:
- Over 65 mixed media art classes & creative sessions by 32 expert artists + Tamara Laporte
- Lifelong access to all Wild Nature Taster Session content (30+ taster art sessions!)
- Learn how to paint beautiful nature-inspired art
- A like-minded, non-judgemental community of wonderful fellow artists and creatives
- Lifetime access to all class videos
- All course content downloadable
- Exclusive access to our private Facebook Group
- Access to your own private classroom
- Work at your own pace, from the comfort of your own home
For questions about A Year of Wild Nature contact Tam and the Willowing Team on hello@willowing.org
unleash your inner wild artist
Why Join A Year of Wild Nature?
We live within nature, but modern life can make it surprisingly easy to feel separate from it — and sometimes separate from our own natural rhythms too. A Year of Wild Nature is an invitation to reconnect. To notice. To become curious. To marvel at feathers and forests, tides and tiny insects, tangled roots, enormous skies and all the strange and beautiful creatures with whom we share this planet.
And through our art, we also make room for something a little wilder within ourselves: intuition, freedom, experimentation, play and creative expression without everything needing to be perfect or controlled.
- 🌿 Are you longing to reconnect with nature through your creativity?
- 🦋 Would you love to spend a year painting animals, birds, flowers, forests, landscapes and other beautiful expressions of the natural world?
- 🎨 Do you want to experiment with mixed media supplies, expressive marks, gorgeous colour, texture and new creative techniques?
- 🌙 Are you intrigued by the symbolism, stories and deeper meanings we humans have found in nature throughout time?
- 🐝 Would you enjoy learning from more than 30 wonderfully diverse artists and teachers, each bringing their own creative voice and interpretation of Wild Nature?
- 💚 Would you love to become part of a warm, encouraging creative community where experimentation and individuality are celebrated?
Then A Year of Wild Nature might be just the creative adventure for you! ♥️🙌♥️
Key Focus / Themes
‘A Year of Wild Nature’ is structured around four key themes:
- Painting Wild Nature Literally – (Think animals, birds, flowers, fungi, forests, oceans, landscapes and all the beautiful beings and places found in the natural world.)
- Exploring the Wild Within – (Using nature as a doorway into intuition, instinct, freedom, authenticity and our own untamed inner landscapes.)
- Nature as Texture, Process & Material – (Exploring natural patterns, organic shapes, earthy textures, mark-making and the colours and rhythms found in nature.)
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The Symbolism & Spirit of Nature – (Exploring the stories, meanings and symbolism we find in animals, plants, seasons, landscapes and the cycles of the natural world.)
The Class Schedule for A Year of Wild Nature Will Appear Here Soon
Who is your host?
Hi! I am Tam (also known as willowing), I’m a mixed media artist, teacher and author. I love making art and I love even more helping people to create self-connecting and life-enriching artworks that support creative and personal growth. I’ve been teaching since 2008 and it’s been my absolute honour and joy to have taught over 60,000 students over the years!
Nature has always found its way into my work, through animals, flowers, trees, landscapes, symbolism, colour and the little worlds and characters that appear in my paintings, so I am ridiculously excited to spend an entire year exploring this theme with you and this incredible group of artists!
I cannot WAIT to see all the beautiful, strange, tender, colourful, fierce and gloriously wild things we create together. 🌿🦊💛
Become part of the Willowing Arts Creative Community!
Our courses are some of the most popular online mixed media art courses and have been joined by over 60,000 creative souls since we first started our business in 2008! 😍😍😍 A huge part of the joy of these year-long courses is creating alongside people from all over the world. You can share your work, ask questions, celebrate discoveries, learn from one another and be part of a warm and encouraging creative community throughout the year.
Meet Your Teachers
We have a wonderfully inspiring and talented teacher line-up for A Year of Wild Nature!
I am SO excited about this group of artists.
Our teachers bring an incredible range of styles, subjects and artistic approaches to the course, from expressive mixed media and beautiful botanicals to animals, landscapes, abstraction, symbolism, portraiture and nature-inspired storytelling.
Together they will bring their wisdom, creativity, techniques, stories and unique relationships with Wild Nature into our creative year.
Your Wild Nature teachers include:
Effy Wild • Christa Forrest • Toni Burt • Lucy Brydon • Eulalia Mejia • Melanie Rivers • Kaaren Poole • Ida Andersen Lang • Laly Mille • Natalie Mecham • Michelle Werl • Kim Dellow • Tamara Łuć • Kimberly Santini • Tracy Verdugo • Ana Paz • Dawn Vander Stoep • Colleen Kastner • Andrea Gomoll • Georgie Forbes • Denise Daffara • Dena Ann Adams • Sarah Gray • Julie Sydenham • Tiare Smith • Dylan Sara • Debasree Dey • Tiffany Sharpe • Angela Murray • Laura Dame • Cornelia Zelinka-Bodis • Marie-Laure Delage-Carlson
…and your host, Tamara Laporte.
Want to get to know these gorgeous artists and see examples of their beautiful work?
Read Teacher Profiles (To Be Shared Soon!)
Below is some artwork by the teachers who will be teaching this year. Please note that these are examples of their work and are not necessarily the pieces they will teach on the course.
Art by (from left to right): Marie Laure Delage Carlson, Georgie Forbes, Dawn Vander Stoep, Eulalie Mejia, Tiare Smith, Kimberly Santini, Michelle Werl, Kim Dellow, Dylan Sara
Value for Money
Making Creativity Accessible to All!
Creativity and crafting can be incredibly healing for people! I have always wanted the healing power of creativity to be available to as many people as possible, so we try to keep the price, for a year long course, with so much content, as low as possible. The course is valued at over $3500, but can now be bought for ONLY £109 or approx $148 USD (usually £179 GBP or approx $249 USD depending on exchange rate). That covers the entire year. Say what?!
You get a year filled with incredible lessons and inspiration for only a fraction of the retail price, is that awesome or awesome? There is no catch here, just me and a bunch of awesome artists wanting you to have access to a ‘library’ of inspiring, enchanting & educational art lessons that help you enrich your art and life. Simple as that. 😊
More Art Examples by our talented teachers.
Art by (from left to right): Lucy Brydon, Debasree Dey, Tamara Laporte, Christa Forrest, Denise Daffara, Ana Paz, Natalie Mecham, Colleen Kastner, Ida Andersen Lang
Praise
for Willowing Arts Courses by Previous Participants
Just signed up! Because: I can’t imagine a year without Tam and her uplifting art and life lessons. I do expect some hardnesses of life that I need to face in the next weeks, months, year. Therefore I know that I really need some Tam-ness as a resource to cope with what is coming. And Tam lessons and chatting during lessons always makes me see the light, even in dark moments. I have no doubt that this course will enlighten each and every week of my upcoming year. Thank you, Tam, for providing us with a year of light. ❤️ – Gabriele Weinfurter
Tam… Thank You! The classes are fabulous, the time involved, the teaching, the thoughtful planning, the colour… fabulous. Thank you so much, it is obvious your heart and soul have gone into so many layers and corners of these lessons! – Karen, Canada
I have grown so much and learned so much about how my different art materials work. I’ve struggled and been astounded at things I’ve created. I’ve been blown away by some of my fellow classmates’ work, and I am determined not to compare my near-beginning to someone else’s middle! I’ve learned how to fix things if I mess up and I’m more confident in my work. And I had fun! I think you undervalue the course – it is worth far more than we pay for it. But I understand you want to keep it affordable for a larger number of people. And Tam, I love love love the little dance you do at the beginning of your videos! It makes me so happy. – Kim DuPree
Hi All! Tamara Laporte, you were my very first online teacher. I will forever be grateful for learning to paint faces, something I thought was only for the very talented artist. It’s led me into years of joy in art. I’m so grateful for your candor, kindness and being so generous in sharing meaningful experiences… your family, a new home, your boys and your fashion. Thank you, thank you and thank you once again! ❤️ – Linda Cox
What you need and need to know to join
A Year of Wild Nature / FAQ
A Year of Wild Nature is all about inclusivity and welcomes every person no matter gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, religious background or age. That said, the course might not be suitable for you if:
- You are under the age of 18 – it is recommended that children and teenagers do the course with a parent or custodian due to the fact that the course is not developed with children in mind, so adult topics may be mentioned or discussed. (Many parents have done the course with their teenage or younger children, if you have questions about this pls email us on hello@willowing.org)
- If you are hoping that each lesson will present a completely new technique and that no technique is ever repeated. Each lesson is fresh and newly created by each teacher, BUT we all work in the same field, so we will likely overlap with some techniques here and there. That doesn’t mean you don’t learn anything new because we all do something different with each technique, each teacher has their own unique style and creates amazing work, just be aware that some techniques may overlap or that some styles are similar.
- If you don’t like drawing faces/ portraits. Though all lessons are different and many lessons will not include drawing/ painting a face, expect approx 30 – 40% of the lessons to include a face of some sorts (either attached to a little whimsical body or as an actual portrait by itself). The rest of the lessons can include: art journaling work, abstract paintings, natural shapes (flowers/ trees etc), animals, whimsical characters, landscapes including houses etc.
- If you have a very slow internet connection or lack technical know-how to navigate websites.
- You will need a high speed internet connection to be able to download and watch the videos. If you have a slower connection it’s still possible to stream the videos online (depending on your speed) and you can also learn through the PDFs, but the best option is to have a high speed internet connection.
- You need to be relatively IT capable. Being part of this course involves things like reading emails, navigating sites like Facebook, downloading PDFs and uploading images to Facebook. If you’re having trouble with some IT related stuff, some help can be offered, but in depth IT troubleshooting is not offered.
- If you are planning on downloading and keeping the videos you will need to make sure you have approx 80 – 100 gbs available. We recommend you buy a separate external hard drive to which you can download all the lessons). The course is not available on DVD or disc drive.
- Here is a tentative supply list. Pls note: you don’t have to buy all the products on this list. Start with what you have and buy only if you really want to buy the products listed. Basic starter pack would be:
We encourage people as much as possible to ‘make-do’ with what they have available and buy some supplies here and there, but overall you can replace and substitute what the teachers use with what you already have. If you wanted to buy the bare essentials, I would buy:
-
- A pad of watercolour paper 140lbs (300gsm) 12 x 9″ or 16 x 12 hotpressed
- A pencil to draw with + eraser
- Some neocolor II crayons, colours: 1. salmon 2. magenta (raspberry red) 3. teal (turquoise) 4. orangish yellow
- A set of watercolour paints
- Student grade or beginner acrylics set
- 1 white posca pen/ 1 black posca pen (fine nibs)
- Some gel medium (impasto gel)
- Some collage papers
- Small pot of white gesso + a brayer
Terms & Policies
- Monthly & quarterly payment plans are available! Please email us on hello@willowing.org to discuss bespoke payment plans.
- All other currency listings are approximate and depend entirely on the daily exchange rate – final sales are in GBP – check www.xe.com for currency conversions).
- Refund Policy: Before the start of the course you can request a refund for the full course fee up to 14 days after the date of purchase. No refund can be given after the course has started.
- Other payment forms: You can pay through paypal or STRIPE (credit card) on this site, if neither of these two options suit you, we can also offer an international bank transfer. If you need to pay through this option, please email us on hello@willowing.org. Please note: you can pay through paypal with a credit card even if you don’t have a paypal account
- Terms & Conditions: When you buy any of Willowing Arts LTD products you agree to their Terms & Conditions which can be read here.
- Please note: if you are based in Europe, VAT MOSS local tax will be included in the final price.
We deeply hope you’ll join
A Year of Wild Nature!
We appreciate the unique presence that you will bring to the group! See you there! ♥️
Click on ‘add to basket’ below to join us! 😊
Join Us Now
Please note: if you are based in Europe, VAT MOSS local tax will be included in the price you pay.
Teacher Profiles (Soon to come)
Class Schedule – A Year of Wild Nature (Soon to come)
Download the Tentative Supply List
You will be able to:
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- Download all class materials to your machine, keep them forever
- Learn many new mixed media techniques and styles
- Grow and develop both personally and artistically
- Connect with like-minded creative people
- Make new artistic connections
- Become part of a buzzing/ thriving art community for a whole year!