Rose Frantzen Masterclass Workshop

Château Near Avignon, October 26 – November 4, 2021

We invite you to join us for a rare opportunity to spend 10 days in a historic Provençal Château Estate with contemporary master painter, Rose Frantzen.

This unique experience includes painting models in the landscape, in the studio and at the estate under the guidance of one of the most extraordinary and gifted artists of our time. The workshop and your accommodations take place on an 18th-century estate built around its own river and a mill.  The estate will serve as the backdrop to this exclusive workshop taught by Rose Frantzen, painting models on the grounds and out on location. During your stay, you will venture into the surrounding countryside to capture the landscape. Your time will be spent gaining painting skills, balanced with a full-immersion experience in Provence.

October is a remarkable time to be in the south of France when mild weather allows us to paint comfortably in the most beautiful villages and vineyards in Provence. Evenings are spent en Château for ongoing painting discussions and art-related activities with the instructor and your fellow attendees.

Rose’s workshops in the USA invariably sell out. She has a well-deserved and loyal following of devoted students because of her extraordinary ability to impart her passion and teach painting in an insightful and accessible manner.

This workshop blends a fantastic program of learning with Rose while immersing ourselves fully in château life. We also get to practice what we learn at various painting locations surrounded by the beauty of Provence. We are following a tradition of artists who traveled to France to live side-by-side and learn from the best.

Other activities include visiting Les Baux, Gordes, Rousillon and St. Remy to walk in Van Gogh’s footsteps and paint where he painted, wine tasting, exploring the vineyard, seeing some of the most breath-taking villages of Southern France and enjoying retail therapy at the greatest Provençal antique and outdoor market.

Rose Frantzen

A native of Iowa, Rose Frantzen returned to her home state after she graduated from the American Academy of Art and Palette and Chisel Academy in Chicago where she was mentored by Richard Schmid. Next, she attended the Lyme Academy College of Fine Arts in Connecticut to study anatomy. 

Rose is committed to life in Iowa. With family members, she purchased the Maquoketa City Hall and transformed it into the Old City Hall Gallery.

She undertook a large project to portray the people from her area. Rose Franzen’s Portrait of Maquoketa comprise 180 portraits of the townspeople. Throughout 12 months in 2005 – 2006, she painted anyone who would show up and sit for a painting without regard to their position in the town.  The project was a bona fide gesture to give back to the community. She said that “Together, we could democratize portraiture, allowing anyone to be painted just by showing up and participating”. The show was exhibited at the Smithsonian. Later, the Figge Museum, in Iowa showed the collection hung on the reverse side of vertical panels, on which a large landscape of Maquoketa was painted in sections. The segmented paintings, when hung in a specific arrangement, align from a single position within the exhibition. The designer who engineered this remarkable installation is Chuck Morris, artist and Rose’s husband. This collection was acquired by the Figge Museum where it is either being shown or arranged as a traveling installation.

As a respected figure in the art community, she serves as a frequently sought-after panelist, guest lecturer, and demo-instructor. Her work has been displayed in prestigious museums such as the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery, the Cedar Rapids Museum of Art, and the Denver Historical Museum.

“Rose Franzen is an effective and very inspiring teacher, as well as an incredible artist. 

Her method of starting a painting is full of life, both on and off the canvas…   I learned so much from Rose about drawing a figure so that its proportions are anatomically correct. 

Her workshop is one of the best of the many I have attended.  I highly recommend it”

– Marion Howard.