Charles H. Cecil Studios Charles H. Cecil Studios is a school of fine art in the naturalistic tradition of drawing and oil painting. The curriculum stems directly from the major realist ateliers of nineteenth-century Paris. Cecil was trained in these techniques by the Boston painter R. H. Ives Gammell and his pupil Richard F. Lack. The aim of the Studios is to teach the perception of nature in light of the masters.
Students begin with drawing, then painting from the cast and figure.
Personal instruction is available throughout these initial stages, as in later portrait, still life and landscape work. In addition, regular excursions and weekly lectures trace the evolution of painting from both a historical and a technical perspective. The studios are located in the most historic Florentine atelier still in active use. Formerly the church of San Raffaello Arcangelo, it was designed as a studio complex by the sculptor Lorenzo Bartolini. By 1850 the atelier passed to his colleague Pasquale Romanelli and has since witnessed generations of artistic activity.