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Coincidentally, I'm in Macon, Ga, as I write this, taking a workshop with John de la Vega, and with such synchronicity, I am compelled to also recommend you look him up. He has another workshop in Ashville coming up in the very near future, which might already be full, but I HIGHLY recommend it.
John is a very accessible instructor, and I am floored by the paintings he brought in as examples. Though I was already completely in love with his work represented on this site, the color of his current work is striking. Seeing his use of brilliant, vibrating color in real life crystallized so many of the lessons I've come across over the years. And I am very comfortable exploring these criteria in my own work.
Among others, he studied with Henry Hensche (I might be spelling this incorrectly, but I can barely stand being online with a standard dialup connection and a laptop), of the Cape School, with whom another of my favorite SOG artists studied with as well (Margaret Carter Baumgaertner).
Look up their work on this site, incredible portfolios. He paints with a 36-color plus white palette, but also describes a 24-color palette that is very similar to the one Baumgaertner uses in her instructional tapes.
Bottom line, I connect to your frustrating position of searching for an instructor. I am going to try also to spend some time at D. Jeffrey Mims' atelier. But after this week with de la Vega, I feel I finally have some of the raw materials, the painting "language skills" to really begin to grow into the painter I want to be.
Good luck with your journey, and if you can get away for even a short, week-long workshop, it will fill your mind so you are no longer working in a vacuum but understanding what the issues are as you come across them in your work.
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