HI FROM ME, CLAUDIA 

WHAT CAN I EXPECT ONCE I'M IN THE ART STUDIO? 

There will usually be a naked person – aged anywhere between 20 and 70 years old, male or female and sporting a variety of builds and body types. They’ll be posing in the middle of the room with artists standing or sitting in a wide circle around them with easels or sketch pads.

The atmosphere is usually quiet and tranquil and the people are generally pretty relaxed. I tend to incorporate music within my sessions, so there may well be music playing as you arrive. 

At times the music may be quite upbeat and energetic also. 

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I vary the format and focus of my sessions quite regularly; though the general structure stays the same. 

• The class starts with a series of warm up poses for around 10 - 15 minutes.

• Then you’ll practise with quick poses. The model will hold a pose for  2-5 minutes and you’ll do rapid sketches of them.

• Then the poses get longer and you do one long one (maybe 40- 50 minutes at the end)

 

The model can hold more difficult poses when it’s just 2-5 minutes, but for the long poses will have to do something easier. That’s why they’re often sitting or lying down for the long poses.

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The session is organised so that you can choose to follow tutor suggestions or follow your own agenda.  I will often suggest exercises to practise specific skills – for example drawing the figure without looking at the paper at all, or only drawing the negative space around the model.

 

The idea of these exercises is not to produce beautiful work, so you needn’t be worried about getting it ‘right’. The point is that these different ways of practising train your ability to observe the figure.

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