The Studio

A.P.S. PADASOR (acronym of the Painting & Drawing Art Studio of Rome) is registered in Italy as “associazione di promozione sociale” (association of social promotion) and was founded by the American painter Timothy Joseph Allen who has been living and working in Rome, Italy for over twenty years.

The Association’s goal is to promote free and unconditional artistic expression, encouraging “making culture”, building moments and places where an international community of artists can meet and share ideas, expressive spaces open to creativity and visual arts, with particular reference to the research and enhancement of works and artists of the past.

The Association promotes visual art in all its forms and the dissemination of the various artistic techniques of painting, drawing, sculpture, mosaic, other pictorial and decorative techniques, putting together an international community that wants to deepen the learning of art in a philosophical, historical and technical context.

It promotes and organizes training, updating and improvement courses in painting, drawing, sculpture and other pictorial, decorative and artistic techniques for educational purposes.

It can promote interventions for the protection and enhancement of cultural heritage.

On its own or with the collaboration of partners external to the association, it organizes and manages exhibitions, cultural events, conferences, workshops, excursions, cultural, tourist and recreational activities that are connected to the purpose of the association and participates, with its own members, in activities also promoted and organized by other Associations, Public and Private parties.

A.P.S. PADASOR Statuto (in Italian)

Timothy Joseph Allen

Founder and President of the Association of Social Promotion A.P.S. PADASOR, Timothy Joseph Allen is an American professional painter who has been living and working in Rome, Italy for over twenty years. He began his career in 1992, earning a BA in Studio Art at DePauw University and an MFA in Painting at Indiana University, Bloomington in 1998. He has also been teaching at The American University of Rome since 2006.

His medium is oil on canvas and his style and subject matter are principally inspired by the Renaissance and Baroque. Of special importance to his process is painting from life: “I enjoy painting most when the presence of the subject and the limit of time combine to add urgency to my analysis, intuition and performance.

In recent years his work has been pre-selected and/or selected in several international competitions including the Royal Society of Portrait Painters, the Figurativas Painting and Sculpture Competition in Barcelona, the World Wide Kitsch online painting competition, and the BP National Gallery Portrait Competition in London.

To understand best what Tim can teach you, please have a look at his paintings and drawings.

If you would like to take private lessons with Tim, please follow this link.

Tim in his studio in November, 2017. Photo by Jeanne G.

Mission

The mission of the school is to teach each student the principles of drawing and painting so that he or she may create an image from observation that results in a convincing illusion of likeness and spatial dimension on a two-dimensional surface.

As Leonardo says:

The first intention of a painter is to make a simple flat surface appear like a relievo, and some of its parts detached from the ground; he who excels all others in that part of the art, deserves the greatest praise.

To best satisfy this mission, nearly all lessons are taught from life, with models for the Portrait Painting, Figure Painting and Figure Drawing classes, and still-lifes or casts for the Fundamentals class.

Curriculum

The school specializes in the following courses:

  • Beginning Drawing: Working from a Still-Life
  • Beginning Painting: Working from a Still-Life
  • Figure Drawing
  • Portrait Painting in Oil
  • Figure Painting in Oil

For detailed information on each course, please see the Courses page.

Location

The group courses are held in Trastevere at “La Bottega dell’Artista“, Via Cardinale Merry del Val, 19b (see map below).