This week we got a new student. Or, she was actually enrolled, but she was not able to show up until this week. She is the only girl of the group, and truly a social butterfly! As mentioned before, the two previous classes were very quiet, everyone was very shy. But she just walked in, started chatting to everybody, and before we knew it, the class was buzzing and laughing and there was a great relaxed atmosphere.The theme of the week was figure drawing. I wanted them to LOOK at the person modeling, draw what they SAW, not what they thought they saw. It turned out fun; each student modeled in front of the others for four minutes, they took turns and returned back to the same drawing, as they each kept the same pose a few times. I wanted them to think of a good pose: not to difficult to draw, and one they could hold for four minutes. We started with charcoal and later moved into pastel, to put a bit of color in the drawing. I encouraged them to draw BIG on the paper, and use as many sheets as they needed. So by the end of the session, four stacks of great drawings were produced, along with dirty faces & fingers, black from charcoal ; - )
They all did extremely well, as previously they worked very concentrated - I had to stress them to LOOK, and also tell them a few times that the figure was the main focus as their fellow student did their pose - hairstyles, glasses and details of the clothes could be added later.
Next week is BLUE - creating a painting in different shades of blue only... I am excited and know they will come up with some surprising paintings.
