About the Course
Learn about love from some of history’s most romance-focused artists.
Romantic love is one of the most soul-fueling values in life. It’s also one of the most difficult to build and maintain.
What exactly is romantic love? How can you achieve and sustain it? What ideas and actions are essential to this profound value?
Answers can be found in art. Through characters in novels, movies, and paintings, romantic art shows us concretely what romantic love is and what it depends on.
In “Romance in Art: What Paintings Can Teach Us about Love,” art expert Luc Travers will guide you through the work of some of history’s most renowned painters—helping you understand the nature of romance and how to succeed in it.
You’ll explore paintings by Gustav Klimt, Johannes Vermeer, Frederic Leighton, and more.
Through their works, you’ll better understand key aspects of romance, such as:
- Flirting, foreplay, and the excitement and uncertainty that lovers feel when first meeting each other;
- Consummation, commitment, and the nature of successful courting;
- How to keep romance fresh and exciting in day-to-day life or after having kids;
- The emotional experience of romance—ranging from tragic to ecstatic; and
- How your fundamental ideas affect your views on both art and romantic love.
If you want to deepen your appreciation of art while learning to love more thoughtfully and deeply, this course is for you.
Missed the course? We’ll notify you the next time it's offered!
How This Course Works
This course is interactive and discussion-driven, so enrollment is limited. Register early to secure your spot.
The course is held live on Zoom, which you can download for free here. Sessions are video recorded, so if you miss a session (or want to review), you can watch the recording. OSI may sell course recordings and/or use them for marketing, promotional, or educational purposes.
The course is 6 hours long, consisting of 4 sessions of 1.5 hours each. Homework assignments are optional. Doing them may require an additional hour or more per week but will greatly enhance what you learn in this course.
Course handouts and supplementary materials are delivered via email. Course participants are invited to an exclusive OSI Courses group on Facebook, where they can post questions and engage in discussions with the instructor and other participants.
Have a question that wasn’t answered here? Read our FAQ or email us at [email protected].
By enrolling, you agree to OSI’s Course Terms and Conditions.
Frequently Asked Questions
OSI courses are live, interactive, and discussion-driven, so enrollment is limited. Register early to secure your spot.
Courses are held on Zoom, and sessions are recorded, so if you miss a session (or want to review), you can watch the recording. You can download Zoom for free here.
Courses vary in length. And some involve homework. Please see the specific course pages for details.
Course handouts and supplementary materials are delivered via email (please register with an active email address). Participants have access to an exclusive OSI Courses group on Facebook.
Zoom is a free video-conferencing app that we use to conduct our courses. You can download it here.
Sessions are video recorded, so if you miss a session (or want to review), you can watch the recording. That said, we highly recommend attending each live session so that you can ask questions and engage with your instructor(s) and other participants.
If you do miss a session, we recommend that you watch the recording before attending the next session.
Anyone aged 29 or younger may apply for an OSI scholarship to cover the full cost of a course. For information on how the scholarships work, please visit our Scholarships page.
You can see all current and past courses here.
If you have a question that isn’t answered in the FAQ or course description, please email us at [email protected].
