Location: To be released closer to the date of the program, with the goal of featuring seasonal environments.
Class Size: 18 Students
Class Fee: $43 – Museum Members receive a special discounted price applied at checkout.
Materials: All supplies are included in the class fee.
Instructor: Taylor Seamount
This class takes place outside; dress appropriately for the outdoors. Supplies may get messy, so casual attire is recommended.
Growing up in the natural beauty of Santa Cruz, CA, Taylor was set on a winding path between science and art. She received her bachelors in biochemistry at UC Davis and later spent two years at the Mark Kang-O’Higgins Modern Painting Atelier in Seattle. After the atelier, Taylor moved back home to Santa Cruz due to a worsening of her invisible disability, POTS. Adapting to her new limitations, Taylor’s artistic practice refocused from large imaginative realist oil paintings to small works in gouache. She came to aspire to the visionary landscape styles of gouache illustrators, James Gurney (Dinotopia) and Kazuo Oga (Studio Ghibli), and accordingly began to study natural color and light through plein air (i.e. painting landscapes on location outdoors). As plein air became central to her creative practice, she developed a distinctive crisp flat-brush style. Additionally, she began a successful business designing and selling her own unique ultra-light-weight plein air sketch easels, fabricated here in Santa Cruz. As a UC Certified California Naturalist and climate justice artivist, Taylor uses plein air and solar punk illustration to envision a regenerative future for her community. In this work, she often collaborates with local activists and environmental stewards. Hobbies not yet incorporated into her work are napping and saying hi to the native plants that are walking distance from her house. Her pronouns are both they/them and she/her.
Class Size: Limited to 20 participants, open to Ages 16+
Class Fee: $40 – Museum Members receive a special discounted price applied at checkout.
Materials Fee: All supplies are included in class fee. Wine, cheese, and other light refreshments will be served.
Location: Santa Cruz Museum of Natural History 1305 East Cliff Dr., Santa Cruz, CA 95062
This class takes place indoors. Supplies may get messy, so casual attire is recommended.
Stephanie Spross is a local artist with a love for transforming beach treasures like sea glass and driftwood into unique, coastal-inspired art. Driven by a passion for breathing new life into found objects, her work brings a touch of nature’s magic indoors, inviting others to find beauty in the unexpected. Originally from the Bay Area, Stephanie moved to Monterey to attend CSUMB.
Location: Santa Cruz Museum of Natural History
Class Size: Limited to 24 participants, open to Ages 16+, all experience levels
Class Fee: Adults $34 | $5 Off for Museum Members
Materials: All supplies are included in class fee
Instructor: Cady DeLay
While originally from San Diego, Cady moved to Monterey in 2022 to study and then pursue scientific illustration. Although her location has changed, her passions remain constant: art and the ocean. Her work focuses on color and exaggerated detail to make the subject more recognizable, accessible, and fun! Recently, she has focused more on 3D pieces, starting with making a four-foot interactive model of a bottlenose dolphin to demonstrate how a dolphin’s body acclimates to diving. Cady has been an exhibiting artist in the Museum’s annual exhibit of science illustration, The Art of Nature, for the past two years.
Website: www.artdedelay.com
Instagram: @cadydelay
Nancy retired from a career in school and public libraries and as a professional storyteller to a home near the ocean in Santa Cruz, California, where she volunteers at the Santa Cruz Museum of Natural History.
Nancy’s most recent book, The Rapping Rocking Dinosaur Band is available now!
Get to know Santa Cruz’s WILD SIDE at the Museum of Natural History. Nerd out on your night out during monthly after-hours events, featuring rotating themes, vendors, and activities. Free admission to the Museum all day 11 a.m. to 8 p.m., with special festivities 5-8 p.m.
