Master Painting Class at the Met (In-Person Class)

Master Painting Class at the Met - In Person

Joao Brandao | Fall | Sep 18 - Nov 17

Class Description:

A unique opportunity to copy paintings and sculptures directly from originals in the galleries of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

This long-established practice has been crucial in the education of many of the greatest painters in history who strongly believed in the value of copying from masterworks. Every participant will submit a total of five artworks for the curatorial review from which only one artwork will be approved for copying. The submission process can be done online but participants are advised to visit the museum in advance. Students will conduct research to determine technical issues related to their individual subjects of study. In general, students develop their copies by following, to a certain degree, the techniques of the original. Other approaches are certainly possible and will be discussed.

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Fall Semester Dates:

Scheduled occurrences for the next semester of this class are as follows:

Week	Date	Time
Week 1:	9/18/2026	Orientation Day 6 - 8 pm ET
Week 2:	9/21/2026	11:30 - 3:30 pm ET
Week 3:	9/29/2026	11:30 - 3:30 pm ET
Week 4:	10/6/2026	11:30 - 3:30 pm ET
Week 5:	10/13/2026	11:30 - 3:30 pm ET
Week 6:	10/20/2026	11:30 - 3:30 pm ET
Week 7:	10/27/2026	11:30 - 3:30 pm ET
Week 8:	11/3/2026	11:30 - 3:30 pm ET
Week 9:	11/10/2026	11:30 - 3:30 pm ET
Week 10:	11/17/2026	11:30 - 3:30 pm ET
Week 11:	00/00/2026	Final Exhibition Reception

*Due to scheduling with the museum, all dates are subject to change.

Before Class - Welcome & How to Prepare for Class
Week 1 - Orientation Day at The Met
Week 2 - Drawing in the Greek and Roman Art Galleries and from Master Works
Week 3 - Grisaille
Week 4 - Painting with Full Palette
Week 5 - Shades and Shadows
Week 6 - Intro to Joseph Albers Color Theory
Week 7 - Color and Light
Week 8 - Color Temperature
Week 9 - Devil is in the Detail
Week 10 - Longevity of a Painting
Week 11 - Final Exhibition

$790.00
In-Person
11 Weeks
Beginner to Advanced

Meet Your Instructor

Joāo Brandao

Instructor

Born in Brazil in 1981 to a family of artists, Joāo grew up in a museum-like house and eagerly absorbed art, gradually learning the commitment and discipline essential to art making. He arrived in the US in 2007 with an invitation to join the residency program at the Josef and Anni Albers Foundation where he developed in-depth studies of Albers's literature on color theory. He subsequently began studying at the Art Students League of New York in 2008 where he was awarded the Joseph Bartnikowski Merit Scholarship Grant in 2010 and the League’s highest honor, the Permanent Collection Purchase Prize, in 2011. He earned his MFA degree from the New York Academy of Art in 2013; being the recipient of a full tuition academic scholarship in his second year, he joined the school's faculty shortly after graduation. In 2019, he received an award from the Golden Foundation which recognizes transformational leadership in arts education. Joāo’s vibrant paintings are featured in public and private collections on both sides of the Atlantic. He lives and works in New York.