Paint & Alcohol

In the past couple of months I have been lucky to partake in two painting classes.  The growing popularity of these “paint while drinking” classes is pretty amazing to me, especially in the Charlotte area.  Coincidentally enough, both classes I attended had a Van Gogh theme to them.  The first being his famous Irises and the second being his Starry Night with a twist.  I am a big fan of these “non-traditional” nights out were you get to access part of your brain that you don’t normally do and have a nice product to place in your home afterwards.  What I am a little “on the fence” about is just how fast these classes force you to paint.  Within a span of 2 hrs, the expectation is that you would have a finished product… but add some talking, some boozing, the process can be rather long for an evening.  The other “funny” thing about these classes is that if you attend as a couple, you have two, nearly-identical paintings (one may be better than the other) so it can create some undesired tension.

My first class was a result of a groupon, but I had fun with it.   There was a group of, let’s just say, older women that started getting a little too “free” with their language (and we had some awkward moments with some inappropriate comments) after the wine had been flowing.  Never-the-less it was a fun evening.

Second class was done via Yelp.  Was super fun and also let me see a new player in these painting class businesses that just opened up:  Pinot’s Pallet.  As an avid yelper, these events are usually pretty charged with a lot of energy and people just having fun with it.  I didn’t stray too far from the color pallet that night, but there were some creative people in the class that had purple skies, green buildings, and my favorite:  Godzilla stomping through the city of Charlotte.

Overall, I will probably attend more of these classes in the future and I suggest everyone take the opportunity to do at least one to see if they like it.  Just approach the class with no expectations (it won’t turn your into an impressionist overnight) and the most important part is just to have fun in the moment.