Category: Paint-Outs

Members of the Nature Artists’ Guild of The Morton Arboretum will find so much more than these fierce predators at the Jurica-Suchy Nature Museum of Benedictine University paint-out on March 6, 2025.

Participants will find approximately 10,0000 specimens on display at Jurica-Suchy, including birds, mammals, reptiles, insects, fish, and much more to sketch, draw, or photograph between 9:30 and noon.

Coffee and Celia Rodee’s delicious homemade muffins will be shared with all. Drop-ins are welcome, but registration, either online by clicking here, or by emailing Celia, is recommended to receive further instructions and updates (and will help her estimate how many muffins to bake).

Some seating is available at the museum, but artists are also welcome to bring their own portable chairs. The museum is located inside of Benedictine University, but the paint-out is scheduled during their spring break, so plenty of parking should be available. The museum will be closed to other visitors during the Guild’s paint-out.

Members of the Nature Artists’ Guild of The Morton Arboretum will be making their yearly visit to Orchids by Hausermann on the morning of February 7, 2025.

Each year, Guild artists pack their bags, not with clothes, but with art supplies, as they head north, not to the airport, but to Villa Park, Illinois, to enjoy the warmth, scents, and gorgeous flora, not of a tropical island, but of Orchids by Hausermann, one of the oldest and largest growers of orchids in the midwest.

Nature Artists’ Guild members are invited to sketch, paint, and photograph orchids inside the display area of Hausermann’s 3-acre greenhouse (before it opens to the public) from 7:30 until 10 am on Friday, February 7, 2025. Registration is required for this event by clicking here, or emailing Celia Rodee.

The year’s first paint-out (or paint-in) for the Nature Artists’ Guild of The Morton Arboretum will be held at Chicago’s world-renowned Field Museum next Saturday, January 18.

Members of the Nature Artists’ Guild, along with members of Artists at the field (a group that meets there regularly), will begin the morning at the Hall of Birds, where “more than 1,000 winged specimens await,” before dispersing to discover and sketch some of the Museum’s wonders of the natural world.

Interested participants will meet to share their discoveries and artwork in the early afternoon, leaving plenty of time to stop by other exhibits or to visit SUE, the world’s most famous T. rex. Artists who are not members of either group are also welcome!

January 18 also happens to be the final day for one of the Museum’s special exhibitions, Audubon’s Birds of America. The exhibit, included with basic Museum admission, invites visitors to “behold Audubon’s vivid, life-size bird illustrations” and “soar through the 12-year process of creating these masterpieces of printmaking.”

Artists (including non-members) can register here to receive an email with all the details, including times, places, and transportation (including possible carpooling groups) and parking tips. Participants are responsible for their own transportation and parking costs and admission to the museum.

On the morning of Wednesday, October 2, 2024, members of the Nature Artists’ Guild will visit the renowned gardens of Cantigny Park to paint, sketch, and photograph the early autumn colors.

Located in Wheaton, Illinois, Cantigny Park is the 500-acre former estate of Colonel Robert R. McCormick, the longtime editor and publisher of the Chicago Tribune.

In 1967, [famed landscape architect Franz] Lipp began construction of this lush, horticultural masterpiece, which is one of the largest display gardens in the Midwest with more than 160,000 annuals, perennials, ground covers and flowering shrubs and trees.  – Cantigny.org

On October 2, 2024 Guild artists will meet at 9:30 on what will hopefully be a crisp and glorious autumn morning with their art supplies, cameras, and chairs (some chairs and benches are already available at the gardens).

While Nature Artists’ Guild members are welcome to stop by between 9:30 and noon, registration is encouraged in order to be added to the email list for paint-out details and updates. There will be no charge for parking or admission to Cantigny for the paint-out.