I did numerous paintings in Central Park, I painted “Le Carrousel” in Bryand Park, I painted the Lions in the New York Public Library among many other references in the city, but for Plein Air painting Central Park has always been my favorite place. Plein air is a French word that means “outdoors” and what it actually means when we do a painting outdoors, using the landscape itself as a reference. I also frequented Central Park a lot to do Plein air paintings. The school is very close to Central Park so on the days when I had drawing class in the afternoon, I went to Central Park to have my lunch before starting drawing class. Not only because it is a drawing room with more than 100 years, but in drawing the live models are always naked and in addition to improving my drawing enormously, I learned to observe the anatomical aspects of the human body and realize how beautiful it is. Especially drawing classes at The Art Students League of New York has something so special that it’s hard to say. My teachers there were Gregg Kreutz for painting and John Varianno for drawing. All classes at The Art Students League are live models which add a lot to learning.

Every morning I had a painting class and twice a week in the afternoon I had a drawing class. My main subject was painting and my secondary subject was drawing. I enrolled in a 4-year Certification Program with a workload of approximately 28 hours per week. Names such as Norman Rockwell, Jackson Pollock, Mark Rothko among others passed through there. I even moved to another country because of this passion, I left Brazil and moved to New York to study at The Art Students League of New York, perhaps the oldest and most traditional art school in the USA. In Brazil where I was born I studied oil painting and drawing at Pleinair Studios, one of the best known art schools in Brazil.

Pet portrait oil painting