Creative Arts   

This class for seasoned sketchers will focus on development of skills through practice using a different theme each week. There will be guidance from the instructor but not specific lessons. Prerequisite: one of the previous sketching classes.

OLLI students will have an opportunity to look at the prints in the Janet Turner collection at Chico State and write about them. This class is for beginning writers as well as experienced ones. Jean Varda and Joan Goodreau, authors and OLLI members, will guide students through the art-to-writing process. There will also be a print exhibition at the Turner gallery in the fall that we will be using to inspire our poems and short fiction/non-fiction.

The Arts of Islam introduces the architecture and arts of the western Islamic world dating from the seventh through the seventeenth centuries. We will review Islamic monuments on the Arabian Peninsula, throughout the Middle East, North Africa, Spain, Turkey, and Iran. Particularly, we will look at the art of the book, paintings, ceramics, and metalworks.

This class is for people who know how to play the basic A to G chords on guitar, although class members may bring other stringed instruments to play, e.g. mandolin, bass, ukulele, banjo, harmonica, or squeeze box. Or sing along without an instrument! Songs and lyrics will be emailed each week, featuring artists like Johnny Cash, Bob Dylan, The Beatles, The Everly Brothers, The Drifters, and other favorites from the 1950s and 1960s.

Monet's devotion to painting the colors of specific times of day is well known. In my class, I'll discuss less familiar aspects of his art in which Monet blends observation with calculated design.

Chico Performances is curating a series of lectures prior to six Laxson Auditorium performances during the 2022-2023 season. These pre-show lectures, exclusively for OLLI members, will be held the Tuesday before each performance at The Social Chico.

When you sign up for a lecture, you will receive a 20% discount on two tickets for each performance. You can purchase your discounted tickets through the Chico Performances Box Office using the code in your registration confirmation email.

Chico Performances is curating a series of lectures prior to six Laxson Auditorium performances during the 2022-2023 season. These pre-show lectures, exclusively for OLLI members, will be held the Tuesday before each performance at The Social Chico.

When you sign up for a lecture, you will receive a 20% discount on two tickets for each performance. You can purchase your discounted tickets through the Chico Performances Box Office using the code in your registration confirmation email.

Chico Performances is curating a series of lectures prior to six Laxson Auditorium performances during the 2022-2023 season. These pre-show lectures, exclusively for OLLI members, will be held the Tuesday before each performance at The Social Chico.

When you sign up for a lecture, you will receive a 20% discount on two tickets for each performance. You can purchase your discounted tickets through the Chico Performances Box Office using the code in your registration confirmation email.

Chico Performances is curating a series of lectures prior to six Laxson Auditorium performances during the 2022-2023 season. These pre-show lectures, exclusively for OLLI members, will be held the Tuesday before each performance at The Social Chico.

When you sign up for a lecture, you will receive a 20% discount on two tickets for each performance. You can purchase your discounted tickets through the Chico Performances Box Office using the code in your registration confirmation email.

Chico Performances is curating a series of lectures prior to six Laxson Auditorium performances during the 2022-2023 season. These pre-show lectures, exclusively for OLLI members, will be held the Tuesday before each performance at The Social Chico.

When you sign up for a lecture, you will receive a 20% discount on two tickets for each performance. You can purchase your discounted tickets through the Chico Performances Box Office using the code in your registration confirmation email.

Chico Performances is curating a series of lectures prior to six Laxson Auditorium performances during the 2022-2023 season. These pre-show lectures, exclusively for OLLI members, will be held the Tuesday before each performance at The Social Chico.

When you sign up for a lecture, you will receive a 20% discount on two tickets for each performance. You can purchase your discounted tickets through the Chico Performances Box Office using the code in your registration confirmation email.

If you like to draw or wish you were more inspired to draw, join us for four sessions of drawing together online. Each class will feature one or more fun and inspiring drawing prompts that we will all work on at the same time. Our drawings may go in very different directions based on how we each interpret the prompts, and that is perfectly fine. Being able to draw together can help inspire us to continue drawing on our own.

This class will teach you drawing in a humorous way. You’ll be introduced to easy methods for learning the fundamentals of drawing. You’ll learn to construct your drawings using basic building blocks. You'll have fun exploring the many possibilities available for creating humorous people, props, and scenes. No experience required, just a sense of humor and a desire to learn. A pencil and some inexpensive paper is all that's needed.

This class picks up where Part 1 left off. There is so much more to cover! We will look at illustration history in Japan, China, and Korea, with emphasis on fashion illustration and illustrators who concentrated on cartooning. I'll also talk about nature illustrations, the human body, and whatever else strikes our collective class fancy!

Get into the sketchbook habit! Keeping a sketchbook helps you generate creative thinking by capturing ideas, observations, and inspirations that may lead to more creations. What you keep in the sketchbook is for you. There is no pressure to share or show anything. Maintaining a sketchbook (daily, if you are up for it!) sharpens your skills with the media you choose to use. Join us for a fun course that will help you start (or revisit) keeping a sketchbook.

Knitting with others is a wonderful learning environment. This class is designed to give knitters who have mastered the basic stitches of knit and purl a chance to work on a project of their choosing while we hang out online with other knitters. All levels of ability are welcome! Gale contributes to the class by offering tips and suggestions for patterns, yarn, and tools based on her years of knitting experience.

Each week we'll view and discuss a feature-length documentary or two shorter films. The films will generally feature a performer or composer, the impact of their environment on their music, and the impact of their music on other musicians and on society. Or the focus might be on a style of music from swing to country, jazz to rock. This is a class for the open-minded and intellectually curious because, paraphrasing Mick Jagger, you might not always hear what you like but sometimes you just might like what you hear.

The original Carter Family recorded over 300 songs between 1927 and 1943. They would become known as the “First Family of Country Music,” their old-time Appalachian songs and musicianship profoundly impacting the bluegrass, country, folk, gospel, pop, and rock musicians who followed. In each class, we will trace some Carter Family history, then learn a few of their songs. Musicians bring your instruments, but you don’t need to be a musician to participate. Interest and enthusiasm will suffice. We’ll do it jug-band style!

Reading poetry helps you to know things more fully, it commands your attention, and it can sustain good conversation. In this class, participants select poetry from favorite sources to read aloud with fellow enthusiasts.

In nine sessions we will look into events in America's journey from the seventeenth century to the twenty-first century, guided by literary and artistic materials. Why do many of us know little of Black Americans' lives, nor much about Black American history? Questions we raise in this course will help answer that. Our inquiry will include asking: When did slavery start in America and when did it end? Why are monuments being targeted in protests? Do differences in skin color really matter?

Sing and/or play popular gospel songs. Bring your voice, guitar, violin, cello, harmonica, squeeze box, or other instrument and join a group of people singing and playing for fun. This is not meant to be religious. It's just a place to enjoy great music. Join us!

Start your Tuesday with music and songs. Join us in a fun, informal weekly sing-along. Bring your voices and/or musical instruments. The operative word is "fun." If you like music, you will like this class. All levels welcome!

Start your Tuesday with music and songs. Join us in a fun, informal weekly sing-along. Bring your voices and/or musical instruments. The operative word is "fun." If you like music, you will like this class. All levels welcome!

The Writer's Workshop serves a community of writers interested in sharing their writing and responding to other writers' work. We will focus on fiction, memoir, creative non-fiction, poetry, travel writing, stories for children, and other types of writing. Following a workshop format, this class will be an opportunity for students to receive feedback for their written work and provide meaningful support to fellow writers.

Learn to write a short 10- to 20-minute play. We will cover the basics of playwriting, including format, structure, character, conflict, and dialogue. This is a workshop-style class in which we discuss concepts and techniques, share what we have written, and write short exercises to develop skills. Prompts will be offered to stimulate your ideas. There will be an opportunity for some of the plays to be performed in the annual OLLI Play Festival.