A new beginning
Last year we said that we said that 2022 was going to be the final year for the courses that Francis Pratt and associates have been running here in Castelnau de Montmiral, for the last thirty-five years. However, Francis’s students put a great deal of pressure on him to continue. Luckily one of them, Ken Marunowski, who first came as a student in 2008 and who is now a thriving professional artist working in USA, has offered to add to his newly adopted role as ‘Associate Teacher’ by taking on the administration of our courses. Accordingly, we have decided to run two courses at the end of the summer. If you wish to enrole, please fill in the booking form, which you will find below.
Dates
First session: August 26 – September 9
Second session: September 16 – September 30
Prices and arrangements for 2023
- Teaching and the use and maintenance of the studio + the cost of breakfasts and four evening meals: €1550. (To convert the prices to your currency at the current exchange rate, you may use this Currency Converter).
- Meals: Students will need to self organize all the meals not included in the overall price (there are self catering facilitates in all the Gîtes. For eating out there are two restaurants, a pizzeria and the tearooms where we will be having breakfasts).
- Accommodation you will need to organise this for yourselves. To help you find accommodation, suggestions are listed below, under the heading ‘Information on accommodation, meals and travel‘, after the ‘Booking Form‘ below.
Footnote: Several aspiring artists have come to Montmiral with the help of grants. If you are considering the idea of taking a university course (whether undergraduate or graduate), or if you are already at the stage of working independently and are hard pressed for funds for ongoing independent study, you might consider the availability of this option for the session you are interested in. In making the application, you should emphasise the uniqueness of the tuition available at this school. An easy way to do this would be to refer the grant giving body concerned to the Course Director page on this website. If your application is not accepted, let me know and I will look into your case with a view to deciding whether I can offer you a reduction.
Deposits
Exceptionally, due to the uncertainties relating to Covid19, we have decided to dispense with deposits. We will have to trust that anyone, who has booked to come, will come, and, that, if circumstances arise to make their coming impossible, will let us know at the earliest opportunity.
Covid19
Although, the threat of Covid19 seems to be on the wane, we cannot know for certain whether it will affect us in the summer of 2023. Accordingly, it might be of interest to you to know that we will conform to any guidelines published by the French Government relating to the “passe sanitaire“, masks, social distancing, etc .
The booking form
Please fill in the online booking form below and then submit it. If there are still vacancies, we will book you provisionally.
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Information on accommodation, meals and travel
Accommodation in Montmiral
Self-catering gîtes regularly used by our students
Chambre d’hotes (Bed and breakfast)
Agnès (Bed & breakfast with one room; convenient for shops): Website
Just outside Montmiral
Sarah Stubbs (Two self-catering gîtes) : Website
Elizabeth and Jonathan Adey (Multiple purpose house with several bedrooms, a separate small gite, large garden and wonderful cooking. Shuttle transport possible) : Website
Hotel on central square
Hotel des Consuls: Website
Useful websites: Booking.com
Breakfast and group meals that are included in our price
- For breakfasts we have been particularly happy to eat at ‘Au Baladin de la Gresigne’, where, by special arrangement, at breakfast time only, we have been offered exclusive use of the balcony or, if raining, a large indoor room. Frederique, who runs the place, offers a wide range of food and drink choices to suit individual needs. The breakfasts have functioned as a very useful start-of-day meeting place, used for coordinating the day’s activity and, when appropriate, for me to give short talks.
- We will have four meals together. These will be on the first two evenings, the last evening and one evening in between.
Getting here
Students need to make their own travel arrangements. The closest airport is Toulouse Blagnac, which is well served by scheduled flights within Europe. For a reasonable extra charge arrangements can usually be made for picking you up at Toulouse Blagnac airport. The drive to Castelnau de Montmiral takes around one hour.
Alternatively there is a regular shuttle bus service to take you from Toulouse Blagnac airport to the train station at Toulouse Matabiau. The shuttle journey time from the airport to the train station varies according to the time of day and can take between 30 minutes and an hour. The train journey from Toulouse Matabiau to Gaillac is around 40 – 50 minutes. We will meet you at Gaillac for no extra charge. Click here for the “locality and maps” page on which you will find three maps that will help you to locate Toulouse, Gaillac, Castelnau de Montmiral and Rue de la Porte Neuve.
For supplementary questions please make use of the ‘contact‘ page.
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