Back by popular demand, I will be teaching a workshop on how to paint fabrics and drapery on consecutive Thursday, March 30 and April 6 at the New Art Center, Newtonville on March 30 and April 6. As of now, there is still space available.
Painting fabrics teaches us how to identify and combine simple shapes and forms, locating the light source, and representing the texture and weight of the material. However, those things can be done in any still life, or landscape or figure, for that matter. It’s the practice of capturing the swoop and flow of how drapery folds and falls that is the best part.
Once you’ve caught how it drapes, whether over a shoulder or over a chair, it’s a subject that allows the painter a lot of freedom because every piece of fabric is the same but different. Universal laws of gravity apply to all. If you express and control different ways that fabric drapes you can create a range of moods from gentle to dynamic.
A Drawing Class For Everyone March 17 – April 21, 2022
I am starting a hybrid drawing class Thursday afternoons at 1:00 – 3:30 at my studio. My studio has limited space for students, so people who want the in-person class will be accepted on a first-to-reserve- a-space basis; we can accomadate all the Zoomers who want to participate. The classes will start Thursday, March 17. The price is $70 per class, $250 for 4 classes, $360 for all six.
There are requests for Saturday morning classes for those who are unavailable Thursday afternoons. Please reply if you’d be interested in a Saturday morning class.
Using demonstrations from still-life and photographs, followed by individual and group critiques, students will learn a framework for drawing: descriptive shapes and forms, value, mark-making, composition and blending and shading. We will also get to know the tools of the trade: pencils, charcoal, brushes, inks, surfaces, and concepts.
Drawing can be learned. Learning to coordinate the eye, the mind and the hand to respond in unison becomes simpler than it may sound as you practice. If mistakes are not going to stop someone from trying again, I can teach them the skills needed to make challenging and gratifying drawings.
“Sketch-Booking Out In The World” and “Learning To Draw; An Introduction to Drawing.”
“Sketch-Booking Out In The World” will be 3 Tuesday mornings: 9/21, 9/27, and 10/4, 9:30 – 12:30. “Learning To Draw” will be 3 Wednesday mornings: 9/22, 9/28, and 10/5, 9:30 – 12:30.
Sketch-Booking Out In The World
Sketch-booking is the activity of filling sketchbooks with drawings of life, from life. Learning to draw is learning to see, and anything and everything going on around us and in front of us is our subject. We have 2 goals for the class: finding the beautiful in wherever we are and discovering that the process of seeing and drawing is just as important and more fun than trying to create a “finished drawing”. We’ll use materials that can fit easily into a pocketbook, satchel or a large jacket pocket: pencils, pens, erasures, and if you’re using brushes and inks, you’ll need a small container for water. We’ll start each class with a few quick lessons, where I’ll demonstrate techniques to develop greater eye/hand/mind coordination and teach you how to practice capturing the likeness and the spirit of a place or a scene. We’ll visit public places to draw where we can watch and draw without attracting undue attention to ourselves like parks, coffee shops and diners, libraries, museums, tourist attractions, even cemeteries.
Rules of the road for sketching:
*Loosen up – Let your hand and pencil wander and meander for your first drawings of the day. *Understand that the process of drawing often matters more than a finished drawing – Do not be concerned with perfect or “right”: they don’t exist. Seeing is the important thing. *Keep your materials list small- You want to be sure that you can carry and access them easily. *Embrace randomness – We are seldom given perfect compositions or subject matter so draw the imperfect ones you are given. *Experiment with materials – Pencil, pen, ink or watercolor? Black, white or red? You decide.
Learning To Draw; An Introduction to Drawing
This class will introduce beginning students to the materials, techniques and different styles of drawing. Using demonstrations with still-life, followed by individual and group critiques, students will learn a framework for how to create a drawing: descriptive mark-making, blending and shading, value, shapes, form and composition. We will also get to know the tools of the trade: brushes, mediums, surfaces, and concepts.
Drawing can be learned. Learning to coordinate the eye, the mind and the hand to respond in unison to visual stimuli is simpler than it may sound. As long as mistakes are not going to stop someone from trying again, I can help them learn the skills needed to make challenging and gratifying drawings.
I am very happy to announce that I am currently in a group exhibit of surrealist artists at Honey Jones Studio, an art gallery at 270 Concord Avenue in Cambridge, MA through the month of April.
Check the gallery website for the gallery hours and please come visit. Also note that there will be an Après Full Moon Closing on Wednesday April 28th from 2 – 6pm.
This is the artist statement I wrote for the paintings I have in the show:
I make art in attempt to create order out of all of the beauty and chaos that’s happening to us all at once, giving form and visual poetry to the onslaught of visual stimuli and conflicting emotions and absolute uncertainty.
The past five years, more or less, mark a return to my life as a surrealist painter. I paint images of contrasting elements: i.e. abstraction/realism, organic/geometric, dynamic/static, infinite/temporary, in order to get beyond the visual world and into the subconscious.
Much of realistic painting over the centuries has had the aim of capturing a moment in time, while most of what we see, and experience now seems to be the opposite. We’re constantly having our attention pulled one way then another, being interrupted by traffic, phones, people behaving unpredictably, Netflix, Amazon and constant advertising everywhere, all the time. And that’s just normal life.
Then comes the unexpected and often inexplicable: light bends so we see a ship floating in air above the sea, historical landmarks burn to the ground in bright orange flame under deep blue skies, and the streets of our mightiest cities stand stark in their emptiness as hospitals and cemeteries are overflowing.
I recently got an email from one of my painting students who asked me if she should continue in the class “since everyone else is so much better”.
To say that’s a common emotion is not to say it doesn’t suck when you feel that way. I know because I’ve done it and probably still do, without realizing it. But it’s also bullshit and left unchecked can be very damaging.
It’s very difficult for most of us to tell how good we are as we’re developing and growing as artists. Practically the only metric that’s available for us is to compare our artwork to what others are doing, and comparing yourself with others is a terrible way to assess such a subjective and emotional undertaking as learning to make art.
The exception to that would be your relationship with your heroes, to whom we can look to for guidance. For instance: “what color combo might Degas have used?” or “How might Georgia O’Keefe have drawn this?” or “How might Beuys have thought about this?” We’ll always fall short if we compare ourselves to them, which is ok. It’s not a bad thing to reach for something you’ll never get if you like the reaching.
Another useful analogy might be: as you’re driving, you can use a stationary object to judge your distance behind the car in front of you (counting “one thousand one, one thousand two” is considered a safe distance). You can’t use something moving to measure against, you need something that’s a fixed point. Comparing yourself to other artists around you is like using a moving object trying to judge your distance from them.
Just about everyone thinks they’re worse than somebody. Some don’t care, some use it as motivation, and some succumb to the pressure of trying to keep up, as they see it, usually to somebody else’s definition of art. It’s really about whether you enjoy painting. Yes it’s very frustrating at times, which is why exercises that teach you to work without expectations are important. Embracing failure for what we learn from it crucial to progressing as an artist, but what is true failure is not painting honestly, meaning you’re painting what others want you to paint, or you’re letting what others think be how you gauge success. To quote Mother Teresa: “In the final analysis, it is between you and God. It was never between you and them anyway.”
A 3-day workshop on different ways of drawing the human figure. There are endless ways to define the figure, and we’ll look at a few methods and approaches that illustrate some of the fundamental approaches we can use. Using photographs and drawings, we’ll be looking at how to see the human body so that it becomes something we can draw and paint. We will identify the gesture of the movement and the specific dynamics of the pose, and then add the parts: arms, legs, head, feet, etc., so they stay connected to each other. We will explore traditional drawing methods to create 3 dimensional forms: blending and shading, overlapping, contrasts, and context, using mostly, but not limited to charcoal, pencils and erasures.
Materials list: Charcoal, Ebony pencils, Erasure, Drawing pads: 1 pad of newsprint, 1 pad of heavier drawing paper for extended drawings
An ongoing Wednesday evening online workshop on drawing the human figure.
There are endless ways to define the figure, and we’ll look at a few methods and approaches that illustrate some of the fundamental approaches we can use. Using photographs and drawings, we’ll be looking at how to see the human body so that it becomes something we can draw and paint.
First, by identifying the gesture of the movement and the specific dynamics of the pose. Then, adding the parts as simple geometric volumes: arms, legs, head, feet, nose, etc., making certain that they connected to each other.
I will show how to create traditional drawing of 3 dimensional forms by blending and shading, creating form, overlapping, contrasts, and context. Materials will be primarily, but not limited to charcoal, pencils, erasures, ink, wash, collage, and paint.
Bring to the first class: 1. Pencils: soft graphite: 2B, 3B, 4B Ebony pencils by Prismacolor are my preference. 2. Charcoal: Several sticks of soft and hard vine charcoal, Compressed charcoal such as Conte or the long square sticks. They give a deeper, darker, more permanent mark than vine charcoal.
3. A pad of newsprint or a stack of cheap, throwaway paper such as typing or copier paper for gesture drawings. Done quickly, they are meant for practice, not for reworking.
4. An 18” x 24” drawing pad for extended studies.
A kneaded erasure, a gum erasure, a few brushes, and a container of water.
In keeping with the times and current state of affairs, I’m offering online classes in painting and drawing.
The format will be that I provide a subject we’ll both paint from, usually either a still life I’ve photographed or a painting or drawing to copy. I begin the classes with a demonstration of what we’re going to paint or draw. I explain how to begin, what materials to use: pencils, brushes and colors, and what to think about as you enhance your skills and learn some tricks of the trade.
Class times vary. Lessons are available at 1 – 2 hour lengths for individuals and 2 – 3 hour lengths for groups of 2 or more.
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