About
SAFA
"If there is a Julliard equivalent in the visual arts,
this is it."
The
Stevenson Academy
of Fine Arts
is a world-class
art school
and cultural
center to Long
Island. This
new facility,is
an expansion
of the highly
respected Stevenson
Academy of
Traditional
Painting, established
in 1960. The
academy has
been fulfilling
the need for
an art school
of quality
that focuses
on technique
and skill ever
since.The new
home of the
Stevenson Academy
of Fine Arts
is an airy,
elegant building
in Oyster Bay
at 20 Audrey
Avenue with
an art gallery
on the first
floor and classrooms
on the second.
An exceptional
faculty offers
classes in
drawing, painting,
sculpture,
pottery, art
history,
advertising
and writing.
The Academy
also presents
community programs
in art, music
and literature.
A very civilized
live Chamber
Music Sunday
Brunch and
a live Jazz
Sketch Night
are just two
in a series
of ongoing
and
innovative
special Events
presented by
the school
to the public.
Instructors at the academy have been selected for their achievements
as professional artists at the top of their respective fields
and for their strong belief in passing on their knowledge.
The director is Attila Hejja, a prominent professional artist
and illustrator whose work can be seen by millions on magazine
and book covers, in national and international print ad campaigns
and in television commercials. He is an official NASA artist,
a stamp artist for both the US and UN postal services, an
official U.S. Air Force artist, designer of the first Star
Trek movie poster and an illustrator for National Geographic,
Time, Reader’s Digest and Popular Mechanics magazines.
His works hang in museums, galleries and boardrooms around
the world.
The Stevenson Academy offers classical art education, teaching
many of the same techniques and principles of the European
art academies of the 19th century. "We focus on providing
the students with skills," says Hejja.There are programs
for the entry level student, the recreational student and
of course, extensive programs for the serious art student
with an art career in mind. "If you have a love of art
and you're willing to roll up your sleeves and dig into the
work, the student trained here can produce remarkably beautiful
results, " says Hejja.
History of the Stevenson Academy
The founder of the Stevenson Academy of Traditional Painting,
Harold Ransom Stevenson, was born in Brooklyn in 1924. After
seeing extensive action in the U.S. Navy in World War II,
he entered the Art Students League in 1948. Following his
training he was selected by Norman Rockwell as one of a group
of five advanced students to study with him in West Arlington,
Vermont. For a ten year period Mr. Stevenson was employed
as a freelance magazine cover artist and illustrator, executing
over 60 magazine covers and numerous illustrations for various
national publications.
In 1960, Harold Ransom Stevenson founded the Stevenson Academy
in his home in Sea Cliff, Long Island. In opening the academy,
Mr. Stevenson sought to correct what he believed was the disastrous
deterioration in training in the visual arts in this country.
He believed that the great timeless methods of the old masters
had been systematically diluted and nearly destroyed in the
name of self-expression, and that this trend has been manifest
in the unintelligible amateurism called "modern art".
It had become difficult, if not impossible, for gifted and
dedicated students to find the training necessary to master
the art of drawing and painting in the classic manner. In
1965, Mr. Stevenson married a fellow artist named Alma Gallanos.
During the seventies, Mr. and Mrs. Stevenson instituted their
"New Renaissance Atelier", from which many students
have become highly successful illustrators, portraitists and
fine art painters. Harold Ransom Stevenson continued to teach
until his death in 1985. Today, the instructors at the Stevenson
Academy carry on teaching in the tradition of Harold Ransom
Stevenson, enthusiastically bringing many years of experience
to their classes.
|
