Reflections on a Year of Art Education

Despite cultivating my art practice in earnest since 2018, this year I embarked on my first year of full-time art education at an academic institution. This took the form of a Foundation Diploma in Art & Design at The City Literary Institute. In some ways this felt ironic or like some kind of admission of failure, I had after all treated my first year of living in Spain as my own ‘self-directed foundation year’, even putting on my own show at the end of the year. But finding myself back in the UK, no longer part of an active art community and trying to move forward from the isolation of working through various lockdowns, the time felt right to embark on my first experience of something approaching ‘art school’. My last experience of formal art education had been taking GCSE art a very long time ago….

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Pandemic Portraits

During December 2020, as we were in the midst of yet another lockdown, I drew a portrait a day of the people around me and a few via video-calls too. Some of these portraits I quite like, others I’d rather lose, but it feels right to document the full sequence in order. Looking at the self-portraits I can sense some of the mental turmoil I felt in those months.

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Just a great article about drawing from the Masters

Drawing from other artists’ work – be it casts, statues or paintings – has a long tradition in art education. This article has a great rundown of this vital part of self-education for many artists. Some great historical titbits too – for example when it first opened the Louvre in Paris used to reserve certain days for artists to work from their collection!

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On Face as Mask and Self-Portraits

Since mid-March 2020, I’ve been seeing a lot more of my own face than normal. Yes, you’ve guessed it, like many other people, I’ve found myself on a merry go-round of video calls as a result of Covid-19. I’ve used video chat to keep in touch with friends and family, to keep working on art projects across borders and most recently to complete an 8-week online art course. And it’s exhausting. I’m no fan of screen-time at the best of times – yes, I’m one of those strange refuseniks who still doesn’t use Netflix! But beyond the eye-strain and tense undertone of blue screen light, I realised there was something particularly emotionally exhausting about the new prevalence of videochat. And mostly that was my face …

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Rodin – Drawing & Cut-outs

Like most people, I know Rodin as a sculptor and clearly a master of the human form. Unsurprisingly he did a lot of drawing from life. I was thrilled to see this show, particularly given how much life drawing I’ve been doing recently!

The most amazing thing about the show was the revelation that Rodin was utterly obsessed with making his figures stand out, even when working in 2D. Continue reading “Rodin – Drawing & Cut-outs”

Autumn 2018 – Life Studies

I have been thinking about how and what to share from the life drawing I’ve been doing over the last few months. I could select a handful of my most successful drawings,  which would perhaps be more flattering to my ego and shelter my nascent artist a little more. But for reasons I can’t exactly fathom, I feel compelled to share my life drawing progress in all it’s stumbling glory.

So here goes, in date order, with  a little commentary along the way. Continue reading “Autumn 2018 – Life Studies”