EDUCATION PROGRAM

Pitch Perfect: Grant Writing for Visual Artists is a supportive, step-by-step seminar designed to help artists build the skills and confidence needed to successfully apply for arts funding. Over six weeks, participants will learn how to craft compelling artist bios, articulate their artistic vision, structure strong proposals, and develop project budgets. The course will also demystify common funders’ criteria, offer practical tips from a past juror’s perspective, and include peer feedback opportunities.Whether you're applying for your first grant or trying to improve past submissions, this course will guide you through each part of the process with clear language and real-world examples. By the end, you’ll have a working draft of a grant proposal and a stronger understanding of how to present your work to funders.This is not just about writing—it’s about owning your story as an artist and learning how to share it effectively with decision-makers.

Maryna: I am a self-taught visual artist with a focus on watercolor and ink, exploring themes of environmental preservation, folklore, and childhood imagination. My current practice includes exhibiting work, leading community-engaged art workshops, and illustrating whimsical animal characters that promote healthy habits for children. I recently completed a residency At Risk Salamander, combining artistic research with storytelling and public engagement.In addition to my studio work, I am deeply involved in community arts—mentoring emerging artists, facilitating public art proposals, and advocating for accessible art education. I am passionate about helping artists with lived experience find their voice through professional development and creative expression.My work aims to build connections between creativity, nature, and community—and I am always eager to share tools that help artists navigate funding, exhibition opportunities, and sustainable creative careers.

Monday

12PM - 2PM

Online

Oct 20 - Nov 24

This course offers an in-depth exploration of the personal documentary film form, guiding participants through the creative and technical processes involved in making their own short films. Participants will gain hands-on experience with foundational elements such as narrative structure, visual composition and sound, all while developing a conceptual approach that draws from their lived experiences and individual perspectives.The course is designed to foster a supportive environment where each participant’s voice is seen as valid and vital. A mix of exercises, lectures, demonstrations, and curated film screenings will help participants engage with both their own work and the work of others. By the end of the course, participants will not only have produced a short personal documentary, but will also have expanded their understanding of how personal truth and creative expression intersect on screen.

Since completing his studies in film production at Concordia University, Roberto Santaguida’s films and videos have been shown at more than 400 international festivals, including Tampere Film Festival (Finland), CPH: DOX, Copenhagen International Documentary Film Festival (Denmark), Contemporary Art Festival Sesc_Videobrasil (Brazil), Flickers' Rhode Island International Film Festival (United States), transmediale (Germany), and Message to Man (Russia). He has also taken part in artist residencies in numerous countries, including Iran, Romania, Germany, Norway, and Australia. Roberto is the recipient of the K.M. Hunter Artist Award, the Chalmers Arts Fellowship and a fellowship from Akademie Schloss Solitude in Germany.

Monday

2PM - 4PM

Online

Nov 3 - Dec 8

Time, as we are conditioned to keep it, is the great illusion: numbers that represent minutes, weeks, years. What significance do these numbers hold when each of us feels Time distinctly and beyond this linear fixity? Our unique experiences have us living in different rhythms of Time that can but collide when we are forming relationships. The stories we tell one another help us understand our varied rhythms, as well as our own histories. In this class, we will build stories together so to push towards release where we are feeling stuck (even dead). Performance art will be our medium of storytelling: work that moves with the same rhythm of time in which each of us already lives, work that confronts audience and our collaborators across the demarcating line that insists these groups are apart, work that engages with the entirety of the space in which we create it, and work that cannot be performed again because of its specificity. Artists who enroll in this course must come with the openness to build and nurture genuine relationships while pushing themselves towards self-confrontation and a collective work that is performed not because it is complete, but rather because it is necessary. This class is for WA Artists who have experienced tangible marginalization in this society because of their class, race, gender, ability, and/or age.

Âwsémoon Shab is an artist, moved by the process of creation wherever it leads her: analog & digital moving image, performance art as the constant reckoning, writing for astrological & tarot study as per the Zoroastrian & Sufi traditions of her ancestry, anti-charity community organizing. Âwsémoon’s work is destructive towards the process of creation. She moves through ideas and mediums with a recklessness that prioritizes relationships and desire for change inside herself, her collaborators, and those who experience the work. Her performance art has existed in public and artist spaces. The former as a method of confrontation, questioning and collective processing; the latter as an honoring of grassroots spaces that are shutting down as capital crushes artists. Most recently, her work has led to the concept of "weaving": how to untangle and re-knot the threads that bind us, across class and identity lines, to feel ours and others’ hearts.

Tuesday

6PM - 8PM

32 Lisgar

Oct 21 - Nov 25

This class is designed to help those who want to sharpen their songwriting and musical skills by writing Hip Hop verses, hooks, Lyrics, sharing their Poetry & learning about the history of hip hop. We will be creating hip hop songs to beats.If you speak another language you are welcome to write in that language. Indigenous Language speakers are encouraged to take the course and write hip hop verses in their language.

Tasneem is a multi disciplinary Artist and Artsworker based in Toronto with a focus on Music, Acting, Writing and Filmmaking. They are a teacher of the Arts and mentor for Storytellers, Filmmakers and Musicians. They made a short film September 10th that Tasneem themselves Wrote, produced, performed in, directed and composed the music to which premiered at Inside Out LGBTQ2S+ festival in Toronto. They have released 2 EP’s many singles and their music has continued to appear in Film & TV.

Tuesday

2PM - 4PM

Online

Nov 4 - Dec 9

ARTS APPRECIATION IS BACK!

Sign up and get the scoop on free tickets to plays, concerts, exhibitions, and more around Toronto. *Limited spots available.

*Most events have a limited number of spots and not all those who register will be guaranteed a spot. When tickets for events become available, we will contact members who have registered for Arts Appreciation. Tickets will be distributed through a lottery system.

Once an event has reached capacity, we may have a wait-list. For events with a wait list, participants are also chosen through a lottery system.

You will receive a confirmation email directly from the Education Coordinator, Teyama, indicating whether you have been granted a ticket or placed on the wait-list.

For more information, please contact Teyama at teyama_alkamli@workmanarts.com

Monday

10AM - 6PM

EMAIL LIST

Sep 10 - Dec 12

Utilizing classical atelier methods merged with contemporary processes, this workshop will go through practices directed towards developing a finished painting from ideation to actualization: preparing the painting’s surface through direct and indirect buildup techniques, developing studies, generating various references, and discussions on materials and supports. Students will complete the workshop with a clear understanding of the foundations of oil painting, and a completed piece ready for exhibition or public presentation. Each session includes 1 hour of demo/lecture, and 1 hour of in class painting/feedback.This class also prioritizes safe practices to avoid solvents, reinforcing concepts about painting best practices. Through rendering of different materials, adding understanding of colour theory, and making figurative works, this class will enhance traditional skills using observation, and application.

Olivia Di Gregorio is an internationally exhibited and published new generation artist in Toronto, having graduated from OCAD University in 2019 with a Bachelor of Design in Illustration, and a minor in Drawing & Painting. Since graduating, Di Gregorio was chosen as a finalist in the Traditional Art category for the Beautiful Bizarre Magazine Art Prize in 2021, and has exhibited work in international galleries from San Francisco, Denver, South Korea, and the UK. Her paintings have also been published in Supersonic Art, and BOOOOOOOM’s ‘Tomorrow’s Talent’ Vol. II, Vol. III, and Vol. IV. This year, Di Gregorio was invited to be a resident artist at The Pouch Cove Foundation in Newfoundland, and selected as a finalist for the 2025 Figureworks Prize in Ottawa.

Wednesday

2PM - 4PM

32 Lisgar

Oct 29 - Dec 3

This six-week online course introduces participants to the art of playwriting through a focus on story structure, character development, and dialogue. Whether you're brand new to writing for the stage or currently developing a draft, this course provides a structured and supportive space to explore your creative voice.Each week, participants will engage in guided writing exercises, scene study, and collaborative discussion. We’ll cover the basics of dramatic structure, explore what drives characters, and learn how to shape dialogue that feels alive. Sharing work is encouraged (but never required), and supportive peer feedback will be offered through optional read-throughs and group dialogue.By the end of the course, each participant will leave with a working draft of a short scene or one-act play, plus the tools and confidence to keep developing their ideas beyond the classroom. The course centers creative exploration, care-based facilitation, and the belief that everyone's story matters on stage.

Note: This course is open to 2SLGBTQIA+ and BIPOC WA members only. It is designed for beginners and intermediate-level writers, with space for those new to playwriting as well as artists refining a work-in-progress.

Kais Padamshi is a multidisciplinary artist, writer, and facilitator whose practice explores themes of belonging, queerness, and diaspora through narrative and short poetry. His poetry is featured in Griot: Six Writers’ Sojourn into the Dark (Penguin Random House), and they are currently developing their debut play Halal, which has been workshopped with Tarragon Theatre and Obsidian Theatre. Kais previously worked at Workman Arts, where they launched the inaugural mentorship program, co-curated the 2021 Rendezvous With Madness festival, and helped establish the ICA PAS Artist Scholarship.

Wednesday

6PM - 8PM

Online

Nov 5 - Dec 10

Throughout our 6-week course, in Queer Ecologies: Part #2 participants will continue to explore interdisciplinary modes of art-making in relation to and in collaboration with the environment. Conversations will include sustainable materials and practices and creating work in response to the climate crisis.Building on skills covered in Queer Ecologies (part #1), participants will experiment with non-traditional art techniques, such as tinting and staining cyanotypes, anthotype processes, and working with natural pigments and dyes.

Note: This class is for folks who identify as LGBTQ+. Masks will be required for this class, to help protect immunocompromised staff and participants.

Sarah Mihara Creagen is a mixed-race Japanese Canadian queer artist born in Nova Scotia and currently living in Toronto. Sarah received her MFA in 2018 from Hunter College (NYC) and was a 2018 Queer|Art Mentorship Fellow. Sarah has had solo exhibitions in Toronto and NYC, and multiple artist-run centres across Canada (Halifax, Montreal, London ON, Regina), with an upcoming solo exhibition at Artcite Inc. (Windsor) in fall 2026.Currently working between drawing, performance, and social practice, Sarah's work consists of research into intersecting histories of the medical system and botany, and considers these topics through personal experiences of queerness, chronic illness and disability while living with Crohn’s Disease. Come visit her this fall at the Garden of Repairs, an active bioremediation garden she's co-directing in Hamilton, Ontario!

Thursday

12PM - 2PM

32 Lisgar

Oct 23 - Nov 27

Noise is everywhere. Sound is ubiquitous. But what distinguishes “noise” from “sound," and where to locate voice in a mouth, an ear, the atmosphere? For 6 weeks, we will respond to such questions through “sound poetry,” focussing on sound/scored works that highlight the intersections between music, art, and literature. Each week has both a reading, or more theoretical portion as well as a practice-based workshop, in order to offer students a range of ways to engage in sound and noise creation, including sound walks, field recordings, listening diaries, vocalization, and transcription exercises. The final week will be reserved for sharing work with the rest of the class, and receiving feedback from peers and the instructor. A phone/a recording device will be required for this class.

Ami Xherro is a poet whose work explores methods and resources of personal archiving to explore the limits of legibility and self. She is the author of the poetry collection Drank, Recruited (Guernica Editions, 2023), which won the 2024 Nelson Ball Prize. Her second book, BED YEAR, is forthcoming in 2027. With the Toronto Experimental Translation Collective (TETC), she attempts to push the practices of translation beyond the tongue and deeper into the body.

Thursday

6PM - 8PM

Online

Oct 23 - Nov 27

We are excited to be able to provide another round of Improv Classes at Workman Arts. This is a course is designed for people of all skill levels. Rooted in the improv therory of Keith Johnstone, participants can expect to learn more about short form improv, while touching base on long form theory. We cover topics from what we need to establish strong scenes starts, finding the "game" in a scene and how to promote play on stage, to how can we find our endings and beats. This course is a crash course into improv, while hoping to create friendships and community along the way.

Aidan Roy is an actor and improvisor from Vancouver, B.C. Over the past 2 years he has made Toronto his new home. He got his BFA in acting from UBC, and use to run a non-profit in Richmond B.C for improv theatre (Richmond Improv Theatre Society). He recently won the best actor award in the New Market international one act play festival, and will be staring a upcoming episode of Saint-Pierre in 2026.

Friday

4PM - 6PM

32 Lisgar

Oct 24 - Nov 28