SESSION CLASSES: FIGURE DRAWING

Molly Segal is a Los Angeles based painter. Born and raised in Oakland, Segal is interested in her home state of California as a site where disaster and decadence converge. Her large scale watercolors explore fragile connections, finite resources, and the price of survival in inhospitable climates. Her paintings have been exhibited at Francois Ghebaly, Charlie James Gallery, The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and Track 16. She was an inaugural artist-in-residence at the Quinn Emanuel Artist Residency in Los Angeles in 2021. Her work has been featured in the New York Times, Whitehot Magazine, Artillery, and Lapham’s Quarterly. She received her MFA from the School of the Museum of Fine Arts in 2013.

She has taught painting, drawing, and watercolor privately and at CSU Long Beach, Tufts University, The School of Museum of Fine Arts, Brentwood Art Center and Golden West College.

“It’s important to give yourself permission to make bad paintings and drawings. Like, a lot of them. My main goal as an instructor is to help students cultivate the skills, confidence, and resilience to approach art making not from a place of fear but exploration.” 

SESSION CLASSES: FIBERS+MIXED-MEDIA

Casey Baden was born and raised in Houston, TX. She completed her BFA at New York University, 2014 and her MFA at California Institute of the Arts, 2020. Baden has been awarded residencies at Haystack Mountain School of Craft, Vermont Studio Center, The Reef, AZ West, Textile Art Center, PADA Studios, at NYC Crit Club's Plum Lime Residency. Her works have been recently exhibited at the La Loma Projects, Spring/Break Art Fair New York and LA, MAK Center for Art and Architecture, Hoarders Gallery, 00LA, Other Places Art Fair, Palos Verdes Art Center, and Palm Court Arts Complex, among others. Her work has been featured in publications including Maake Magazine, ArtForum (online), Hyperallergic, Voyage LA, and Materials and Applications. Presently, she is teaching Fibers: Special Topics in Art at Harvey Mudd College.

SESSION CLASSES: DRAWING IN BLACK+WHITE

Leslie Lanxinger is a Los Angeles based visual artist, specializing in painting, charcoal drawing, and mixed media sculpture. She began to develop her approach to teaching in New York City in 2002, where she taught her first sculpture workshop. Leslie believes that each young artist must find their own individual voice, and she creates a positive and creative atmosphere where students feel empowered to explore.

Her work has exhibited in Los Angeles, New York, Atlanta, Tokyo, London, and Miami. Select awards include the Franklin Furnace Award, the Brooklyn Arts council Grant, the San Francisco Center for Cultural Innovation Grant, and the Brand Associate Patron Award. Museum shows include the Wexner Center, Ohio, the Harn Museum, Florida, and the Institute for Contemporary Arts in Boston and Atlanta. She received her Masters of Fine Arts from the School of Visual arts in New York and her BFA from the Atlanta College of Art.

MATERIALS & TECHNIQUES WORKSHOPS: BOOKMAKING

Amanda Mears is a British-born, Los Angeles-based painter and maker of sculptural books. Her work focuses on a deep engagement with the natural world. Amanda studied painting at Turps Art School, London, and earned her MFA at Claremont Graduate School. She is the creator and facilitator of a worldwide, eco-social, collaborative artist book project called Leaving Earth. Amanda has taught painting and drawing privately, at the University of LaVerne, and the Los Angeles Academy of Figurative Art. She earned a certificate of Ethical Pedagogy from Claremont Graduate University.

MATERIALS & TECHNIQUES INTENSIVES: GRAPHIC ARTS/PRINTMAKING

Noelani O’Hare is a senior at the University of Pennsylvania studying Design and Cognitive Science. Originally from LA, she is a proud Institute for Visual Arts alum—having studied at IVA year round from kindergarten through high school as well as attending sporadic college-level classes during her summers home. Now, her practice focuses on graphic design and printmaking—having found a love for linocuts and screen printing in high school. She currently works as a Press Assistant at the Common Press (a letter press printing studio in Philly) and hosts letterpress printing and linocut workshops. In her free time she keeps up her passion for screen printing and all things experimental printmaking—releasing small drops of hand-printed merch as well as hosting screen printing events for Penn and Philly’s Institute of Contemporary Arts. (ICA) Noelani is thrilled to return to IVA to assist in conducting materials and techniques intensives for teens in graphic arts alongside her longtime mentor.

MATERIALS & TECHNIQUES WORKSHOPS: PHOTO+COLLAGE

Naomi White is an artist and educator, working on ideas at the intersection of political ecology and photography. Throughout her work White addresses an array of contemporary issues, asking how we can shift our focus away from the current capitalist model of exploitation, to one of equity and collective voice, for all people, animals and the planet. 

White is the winner of PDN’s Objects of Desire award, and a finalist for the Hopper Prize, 2023.  She has exhibited throughout North America and Europe, including art fairs Scope Miami, Spectrum Miami, and Photo LA. Her work has been published in PDN, The Brooklyn Rail, Cut Me Up, FAYN, and Uncertain States.  White has lectured at the Center for Ethics at Cal Poly Pomona, Santa Monica City College, and UCLA Extension. White holds an MFA in Photography and Related Media from SVA in New York, a Post Baccalaureate in Photography from the San Francisco Art institute, and a BA in English Literature from San Francisco State. 

White is the faculty chair of the photography department at NYFA in Burbank. Teaching is an essential part of her artistic practice. She teaches classes exploring theoretical and historical concerns, graduate seminars, FAYN magazine, curation, and collage.