Diptychs, Triptychs, and Beyond
with Manuela Thames
September 16 – October 3, 2025
Course Description
Diptychs and triptychs and quadriptychs have become popular ways to allow images to tell a story or evoke a concept or feeling. It is a fun, creative, and imaginative tool to communicate one’s vision as an artist and give new meaning to images.
Photo-based artist Manuela Thames begins this six-session online workshop by introducing and reviewing the techniques necessary to create diptychs using Adobe Photoshop. You then practice the techniques through various assignments throughout the workshop. As you become more comfortable with these basic techniques, we move on to creating triptychs, quadriptychs, and beyond to explore alternative ways of creating such combinations outside of Photoshop. In addition, we dive into the basics of color theory, visual design and the creative possibilities of including mixed media. Each of our group session includes an image review led by Manuela followed by an inspirational look at a diverse selection of photographers who are pushing the boundaries of joining images to tell their stories.
The goal of this workshop is to develop one’s own vision for combining and pairing photographs and to better understand how to choose the right images, as well as to enjoy the experimentation, play, and surprise that comes with this process. Join Manuela to be inspired and expand your horizon for creative image making. Her new workshop is open to photographers of all genres including portraiture/self-portraiture, landscapes, street photography, and still life.
Additional Information
WHO SHOULD ATTEND:
What You Should Know:
Working knowledge of digital workflow and manual mode on your digital SLR or mirrorless camera. Participants must be able to download and select images using image editing software for class sessions. A proficiency in Adobe Lightroom or Photoshop is required for this workshop.
Special Notes:
Class will meet 9:30 – 11:30 am (Mountain Time) on Tuesdays and Fridays starting September 16 and ending October 3 (six online group sessions). Enrollment is limited to 12 participants.
Zoom Video Conferencing software (available for no charge from Zoom.com) will be used to facilitate the class sessions. Further details will be emailed to registrants.
Santa Fe Workshops always aims to produce a high-quality experience for our online attendees. That said, variables including regional and local internet provider speeds, traffic on Zoom's servers, and your own computing hardware can contribute to a less than ideal streaming event. While we do our best to minimize the impact of these variables, they are outside the control of Santa Fe Workshops.
Policies:
View Withdrawal and Transfer Policies for online programs.
For the convenience of participants, recordings of each class session are posted privately for one month after the end of each session. Santa Fe Workshops takes the recordings down after one month to protect the intellectual property of our instructors.
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about
Manuela Thames is a photographic artist based in Saint Paul, Minnesota where she lives with her husband and two children. Born and raised in Germany, she moved to the US in 2004 after marrying her American husband. Shortly thereafter she began her photography journey after two life changing events happened within one year, the birth of her first son and the death of her brother.
Largely self-taught, Manuela uses various photographic techniques to explore themes around loss and grief, her personal experience with generational trauma, as well as the notions of belonging, connection and what it means to be human. Within that she continues to explore human ways of coping, the strength that evolves out of suffering and our common desire for healing and journey towards wholeness. Much of her work consists of black and white, conceptual self-portraits.
Manuela’s photography has been described as contemplative, evocative, dark, and cinematic and has been widely exhibited nationally as well as internationally. Her “Trauma” series won 1st place conceptual series of the year in the Monovisions Award in 2019, and in the same year she won the 13th Julia Margaret Cameron Award in the Self-Portrait Category. In addition, her work has been published online and in print in such places as Black and White Magazine, Sun Magazine, Dohdo Magazine and Shots Magazine.
Website: manuelathames.com
Instagram: @manuelathames
