Our Award Winning Instructors

REBECCA BRODBECK

Rebecca Brodbeck has a Bachelor’s Degree from the Maryland Institute College of Art and a BFA in Art Education. She currently works as a freelance soft goods designer for multiple juvenile products companies. Rebecca resides in Dover, PA, with her husband Paul and children Andrew and Regina. She has taught children’s classes at York Art Association for multiple years and looks forward to sharing her enthusiasm for art with children. Her favorite mediums are watercolor, pen and ink, and collage.

BARBARA PILLETTE BUCHANAN

Barbara Pillette Buchanan is a graduate of the Art Institute of Pittsburgh. She has exhibited at the Society of Illustrators, completed illustrations for Reader’s Digest Great Book series, the Bon Ton and Pfaltzgraff. She has won many national and regional awards and her work is in private and corporate collections along the east coast. Barbara and her husband Robert’s work can be viewed at the Garth Gallery in Columbia, PA.

LINDSAY DIDIO

Lyndsay Didio is a highly skilled Art Educator with professional experience in graphic design. Since 2005 she has worked as a professional commercial graphic designer with experience creating print-ready marketing material. Since 2008 she pursued her graduate degree in Art Education. She has developed and implemented art curricula for sum-mer camps, high school drawing and painting classes, elementary art classes (grade K-5), and a middle school graphic design classroom. While at West York Middle School, she executed and developed curriculum for grades 6-8 focusing on graphic design principles. Lindsay created the West York Middle School “Young Creatives”, a group of young people with high achievement. This group was the acting in-house design team for the middle school, creating print material needed for school events.

As an Art Educator at The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Lyndsay created and implemented six summer art camp programs for students ages 5-13, at the end of which she hung and facilitated a gallery exhibition of student artwork. She also created and implemented three adult art programs, both instructing and critiquing student artwork. She was Production Manager at Virtual Sciences LLC, where she gathered & edited AutoCAD files to trans-late architectural floor plans into artistic renderings using Adobe Illustrator. She worked with the creative team to assemble accurate 3D renderings of commercial properties as the 2D consultant, and coordinated and facilitated several photo shoots with professional models to build Virtual Sciences stock video and photography files. She assumed the position of point person and liaison between the firm’s clients and the creative team-answering questions, sending files to be printed/proofed, and putting together tear sheets and marketing packets.

THOM KULP

Thom Kulp is a graduate of Harrisburg Area Community College where he studied painting and drawing with the colorist painter, Edith Socolow. He has attended Lebanon Valley College and Millersville University and is retired from the U.S. Postal Service. Currently he works part-time at Stauffers of Kissel Hill in Linglestown, where he indulges his other passion of horticulture. After having taken the Experimental Mixed Media class with Linda Benton-McCloskey for several semesters at the Art Association of Harrisburg, Thom began teaching this class during the summer semester of 2010. He has conducted an Experimental Mixed Media workshop in State College, PA, this past January and judged the York Art Association’s abstract show this past February. His work is primarily an exploration of acrylic-compatible mediums. He is currently being represented by Garth Gallery in Columbia, Pennsylvania and Gallery @ Second in Harrisburg. Thom has also participated in numerous group and solo shows in the Harrisburg area.

MELANIE MAXELL

Melanie Maxell currently resides in Red Lion but has always lived in York County. Her love of creating art began as a child and she fondly recalls her first box of pastels. She is a mixed media artist specializing in realistic Watercolors and Abstracts done in acrylic and other mediums. She is the Chair of the Education Committee of the York Art Association and has taken many classes with Debi Watson, George Clark, Phyllis Disher-Fredericks, Steve Aimone and Linda McCloskey just to name a few… As a long time writer, she has combined her love of art with her love of words and is creating Art Journals.

RON SCHLOYER

Ron Schloyer is a resident of Hanover, PA., who began painting seriously after graduation from Mansfield University. After attending an exhibition of Andrew Wyeth paintings, he shifted to the watercolor medium and has remained there ever since. Ron has studied at the Fritz Schuler Briggs classes at the Schuler School in Baltimore, MD; Wasyl Paliczuyk classes at McDaniel College in Westminster, MD; Armando Ortiz at the Hanover Area Arts Guild, workshops conducted by such luminaries as the late Zoltan Szabo, Dominic DeStefano and Frank Webb. Ron is a signature member of the American Watercolor Society, the Pennsylvania Watercolor Society and both the Baltimore and Philadelphia Watercolor Societies. Ron is a member of the Adams County Arts Council, the York Art Association, and the Hanover Area Arts Guild where he serves as a board member and teaches watercolor classes. Ron also teaches for the Adams County Arts Council. He has won numerous awards in local exhibitions and has had paintings accepted in the American Watercolor Society International Exhibitions, the Pennsylvania Watercolor Society’s International Exhibition and the Philadelphia Watercolor Society’s Exhibition. Ron has also had a painting published in Splash 12 and his paintings can viewed at www.hanoverareaarts.com.

TESSA SIEWERT

Tessa Siewert is a recent graduate with Bachelors in Art Education from the Tyler School of Art at Temple University in Philadelphia, PA. She student taught in an Elementary School and High School in the Philadelphia area where she was able to work with a wide array of students from Kindergarten to 12th grade. Projects and courses included all mediums from painting, drawing, and printmaking as well as sculpture, ceramics, and digital computer art classes. Tessa loves to work with children of all ages, watching them master the materials and gain confidence as young artists. Her motto and teaching philosophy is Michelangelo’s “Ancora Imparo”, meaning “I am still learning”, which she tries to instill in all her students. With a focus on figural work, Tessa enjoys working in different mediums from painting to drawing as well as photography. She has done freelance work with portrait photography for families, friends, and businesses in the Central Pennsylvania area throughout her college career.

JOANNE YOUNG STEPHAN

Joanne Young Stephan is an artist with a passion for hand-lettering. She incorporates many painterly techniques as part of the presentation of the artwork to appropriately express the meaning of words and their message. Joanne designs and produces full-color artwork for local and national clients. Her skills range from painting and illustration, to the lettering and decorating of large custom resolutions. Many of these pieces are designed to honor the recipient for accomplishments in their field. She alsocreates artists’ books. Joanne Young Stephan is a graduate of Pennsylvania School of Art and Design with an Associate Degree in Communication Arts. She has studied extensively with nationally and internationally acclaimed calligraphic artists. Joanne’s work has been accepted into many Juried Calligraphy and Art Shows, including the International Calligraphy Engagement Calendar, the Berks Art Alliance Annual Juried Show and the Philadelphia Calligraphers Society “Philadelphia Flourishes” juried show. Using both acrylic and water-based media her inspiration comes from many personal life experiences. “My great joy is in the making of letters.”

PAT WERTZ

Pat Wertz attended the Maryland Institute, College of Art and graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Art from Moore College of Art. Pat has worked as a graphic designer in advertising and magazine publication in Boston, Philadelphia and California. Additionally she had a long career in the corporate world working as a product designer and colorist before devoting herself to her passion for painting. Pat’s work can be viewed at www.redravenartcompany.com under “Visiting Artists”.

LYNNE YANCHA

Lynne Yancha has achieved national recognition, as is a signature member of the American Watercolor Society and the Pennsylvania Watercolor Society. Her methods have been featured in Splash: America’s Best Contemporary Watercolors, and Splash II: Watercolor Breakthroughs, published by Northern Light Books. Lynne is a trained teacher, loves people and is willing to share her world and talent with anyone who is interested. In her own words: “I always begin my work with musings and I use the same technique as always in a layered, lost and found way. My media continues to be mixed: watercolor, ink, white acrylic, colored pencil and of course graphite. I still love edge to edge interest, and a story: yours and mine. Mostly I am absolutely in love with the mystery of inspiration and how it affects the process. The painting will be entirely different from the image with which one begins and it will always tell its own story.”