Will to Adorn with Nydia Blas

Led by artist and professor Nydia Blas, this four-week workshop is an invitation to be still, work slowly, and create in community with one another. Through processes of play, we will adorn photographs, transforming them into unique pieces of photo-based art.

Will to Adorn is for anyone drawn to hand sewing and embroidery, working with fabric, photo collage, and beyond. Participants will be encouraged to follow their intuition and explore different materials, sharing skills and knowledge with the group along the way. No previous experience is required.

To get started with the creative process, participants will make digital negatives and print them on pretreated cyanotype fabric. From there, the possibilities open up. Participants will have the choice of working in a multitude of ways and are encouraged to bring their own photographic prints, digital files, items for adornment (beads, thread, and the like), and ephemera for cyanotypes, such as plants, flowers, and feathers. An inkjet printer will be available for printing text or small imagery for embroidery work.

At the end of our four weeks together, we'll share what we've made with one another.

Beginning Saturday, July 11th, this class will meet weekly from 2 - 4 PM for four weeks at Atlanta Center for Photography.

Instructor Bio:

Nydia Blas is a visual artist who grew up in Ithaca, New York and currently resides in Atlanta, Georgia. She holds a B.S. from Ithaca College and received her M.F.A. from Syracuse University in the College of Visual and Performing Arts. She is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Art and Visual Culture at Spelman College in Atlanta, Georgia. Nydia is a 2026 recipient of the Creative Capital State of the Art Prize in Visual Arts. Her work has been commissioned by The New York Times, New York Magazine, The New Yorker, and Time Magazine. She has completed artist residencies at Constance Saltonstall Foundation for the Arts, The Center for Photography at Woodstock, and Villa Albertine in Marseille, France.

Nydia uses photography, collage, video, and books to address matters of sexuality, intimacy, and her lived experience as an American girl, woman, and mother of Afro-Panamanian descent. She delicately weaves stories concerning circumstance, value, and power and uses her work to create a physical and allegorical space presented through a Black feminine lens.