Barbara's News / Press

Dec. 12th
L.A. Times Travel Section article by staff writer, Jeannine Stein

“For Beginners Too.  Art retreats are not just for the experienced.  Beginners are welcome, and students are encouraged to explore other media and techniques.  I took “You Can Learn to Draw” hoping my horrific attempts at sketching would improve.  They did, thanks to instructor Barbara Roth, who gave the class some easy tips.  Although my portrait looked vaguely like a police sketch, my pig looked pretty much like a pig.  I was thrilled.”

Carlos Alcala’s Oct. 11th
Column in the Arden Carmichael section of the Sacramento Bee

 “Artist finds new use for disposables.  Palette-able mints: People ask painter, Barbara Roth whether she lived through the depression.  It’s not her age.  It’s her tendency to “repurpose” things.  Cereal boxes get used for book holders.  She turns cookie tins, round cheese boxes and Rubbermaid containers into portable art studios.  At an upcoming class at the Sacramento Fine Arts Center in Carmichael, she’ll teach students how to build a mini-paint box by gluing water bottle caps into an Altoids tin.  Some people think this is being cheap.  It’s just resourceful,” Roth said.  Plus with mini-palette, a sawed-off brush and postcard-sized watercolor paper, you can paint in a waiting room, a train station, anywhere, anytime. “ People’s lives are so busy, they have to squeeze it in,” she said.  We love this kind of resourcefulness.”

Recent evaluation forms from students in her classes said:
“I was skeptical that I could learn to draw in a day, but Barbara is such a fantastic instructor that it is possible. Barbara is a very patient, reassuring teacher.”
 “Barbara is a wonderful teacher, relaxed, great sense of humor!  I learned so much, and enjoyed completing my first ever watercolor!”