I attended a drawing session with Bethany, one of the first year students. I love her work so was really interested to do some drawing with her, mainly I thought it would be a really beneficial thing for me to do. I really enjoyed Bea's presentation when she highlighted how she comes back to drawing and I found when my printmaking wasn't going well over new year I really took solace in the fact I produced some decent drawings in the forest that I'd really enjoyed making.
I've never done a drawing session like this before - I've only done life drawing so didn't know what to expect but was encouraged by the fact there would be prompts but that we could also use our own material if we wanted to.
Bethany is so professional - she really knows her drawing stuff! I enjoyed the warm up exercises although I found I couldn't get interested in the bike image so I switched to a photo of the forest instead.
I started in charcoal with a rubber and some chalk and enjoyed the 3 minute tasks where I just made a lot of mess and played. As the times got longer I found I really needed to be interested in the image and I really struggle to draw from a screen so I was trying to use picture of the forest, views I wouldn't usually draw and think about the prompts that Bethany was giving which were helpful - not using lines, contrast, different edges of the material etc.
By the time we got to the longer exercises I decided I was fed up with charcoal. I really enjoy the work of people who can use it well. I am not one of those people. It's messy, it doesn't do what I want it to and I end up losing patience with it very easily. I'll save the charcoal for life drawing in big gestural ways!
I got my forest sketchbook and water soluble crayons out and enjoyment returned. I had raced upstairs and got my watercolour brushes. I've been meaning to try them with the crayons instead of the manky water brush I usually use. I was really disappointed that I didn't like it at all! They're almost too soft and delicate, I need the plasticky-ness of the water brush (not a nice water brush - mine is about the cheapest, nastiest one you can buy - a large headed one from a set of 3 bought for about £1.99 from a local garden centre!). I was trying to draw a view of close up small tree trunks, with some lovely silver birches in there and I really enjoyed playing with the materials but it really reinforced the fact that I don't like drawing from photographs at all. I want to at least start my sketches in the forest, completing them from memory once home I can do, but doing a whole sketch from a photograph just feels wrong.
It was really interesting to do this session. It definitely confirmed / made me realise a few things about myself:
Drawing from 'real life' is important - drawing exclusively from memory or photographs isn't something I enjoy
The experience of using the materials can make/break the enjoyment of the drawing
If I'm not enjoying it there's no point - move on as time is precious
I can't just draw for the sake of it, I need to be interested in the subject/materials (this was a bit of a realisation - I always thought I would be happy to just sit and draw anything!)
Sticking to what I know is ok - I experimented a lot to find the thing I like
I'm not that 'good' at drawing and that's ok
Trying new things and experiencing what others do is really interesting
The drawing from the phot that I produced at the end is rather rubbish, but there wee some marks on the tree trunks that I liked and I enjoyed the layering of the crayons. I was trying to tick far too many boxes with this and failed to really tick any. Main lesson - don't draw the forest from a photo on a screen at the kitchen table - get of bottom and go to the forest and feel the frozen fingers and muddy dogs and have absolutely no idea what the time is... if only I could take Bethany with me! I'll have to take some notes of the things she told us to think about and take those into the forest as I think that would be really helpful!
I felt very guilty at the end as I would have loved to be able to hang about for a chat and to see what everyone else did but I had to race off, at least I didn't have to share the mess I made!
