Full house for Sian

Last night there was a record turnout of 20 members (including two youngsters) for Sian's tutorial on Character drawing from the imagination. 

The first stage involved loosening up, and responding to the mark, by developing images from "squiggles". We then developed characterful faces and bodies from often eccentric shapes, divided into 4 by 2 crossing arcs.

Sian then showed how to put characters in a setting, and described arranging shapes within a frame to make a balanced composition. She circulated a wide range of illustrated books and images for us to analyse and take ideas from.

Next week we will be developing facial expressions, and working towards our final pieces. Eventually, we'll post some of the final images here.

Character drawing from the imagination, by Sian

I thought we could start the session with some basics on character drawing, by looking at some key artists in Disney in character development, Japanese Art and line work, followed by some fun games involving drawing characters to spark our imaginations up. Then we can move on to the principles of illustration and putting our characters into a scene, using our own individual style to our own advantage.



If you have a poem, story, children's tale, a sentence, a word, a concept or a picture that inspires you, that you think you would like to illustrate, then feel free to bring this along and once we have played some games and looked at the principles you could begin to work on your own interest. If you don't have anything in particular you would like to illustrate don't worry: I will bring lots of picture books and images with me to so we can look at them and be inspired.



Also Marian mentioned a lovely way of putting a book together, a way of folding the paper to make a little book so our ideas could also progress to this, either in this session or through into the next one!

Back to Skool

We are having our first session of the New Year this Thurs, 12 Jan. Sian will be mentoring the topic "Character Drawing". More info shortly.

Communal drawing (part of our last evening before Christmas)

The aim of this exercise was to encourage intuitive response to pre-existing marks on the paper, whilst the mood was created by music (stride piano). Everyone had a large sheet of paper and made random marks for 2 minutes. They then passed their sheet to the left, and over the next 2 mins responded to the marks they saw, making either representational or non-representational marks of their own. The process was repeated, and when all 16 members had marked each sheet, the exercise stopped.

The pictures below show a selection of the "images" produced by the same people using the same media. There are echoes of surrealism and cave-paintings.

Blindfold drawing

Marion took this photo of Dot and Fiona at work on 1 Dec. It speaks for itself!

Meeting 8 Dec 2011

This Thurs being the last session this year, there will be an arty-party feel to the evening.

Juliet and Ann M are handling the catering, and I will be nagging you do some expressive communal drawing to music by candlelight. I'll bring the inevitable grey paper, if you can bring charcoal and chalk or pastel.

Best wishes

Harry

December activities and Christmas break

We will be meeting for the first two Thursdays in December and, after the Christmas break, reconvene on 12 January 2012.

On 1 Dec we will be having fun doing wacky drawing (click on the Programme tab above for more details.)  Bring cheap paper, pencils & charcoal ... and an open mind, which goes without saying, of course.

Juliet has suggested that on 8 Dec we have an art-and-social evening, with mince pies and seasonal drinks. Details to follow soon.