“A person’s identity,” Amin Maalouf wrote as he contemplated what he so poetically called the genes of the soul, “is like a pattern drawn on a tightly stretched parchment. Touch just one part of it, just one allegiance, and the whole person will react, the whole drum will sound.”
— BrainPickings.org
Chi Mai and I went to a live model workshop today and it was an exciting experience. We were 8 artists, we paid $15 for a session of 3 hours and the model was exceptional. He weaved his body into shapes that could only stem from a dancer’s body and also someone who practices some form of meditation. We started at 1:00 pm sharp and had five 1 minute sessions, then we had minute sessions, then 10 and finally we finished with three 20 minute sessions back-to-back.
To prepare for this I decided that I would do some “gesture” drawings for the one minute sessions where I tried to capture the movement as opposed to the shape of the model. In five seconds I needed to sketch the entire body and its movement, which is quite fast and is excellent in taking out the tension in our bodies. Then I moved to “contour” drawing for the longer sessions. If you are interested in learning more about these techniques, there is an excellent book that I have had for years that is named — Nicolaides “The Natural way to Draw” that is well worth the price. Here are two examples of what I tried to do.
If you would like to join us, these live model sessions go on every first Saturday of the month and you can find the info here. On top of this, the location is quite exceptional as there is small park, hundreds of graffitis, NO parking meters? (can you believe this), an overpass, an exceptional view of the city (if you go on the overpass outside). All in all, a really nice experience!
Workshop: Atelier Modèle Vivant Art-Faubert avec Karsten Kroll Danseur
Location: 5795, De Gaspé, Montréal
Painting to see : Peindre pour voir 