Figure it out

My favorite class of the session is Week 5: Gesture Drawing and Drawing from Life. 

I set out drawing boards, charcoal and newsprint for the students. The newsprint was a mix of old (already drawn in) and new pads. One student had taken a new one, then put it back, saying it was too much pressure! He preferred a used one. 

They liked using the charcoal and newsprint. Some interesting reactions this time: one student liked the physicality of holding the charcoal, but didn't like the size. We were using big charcoal. I mentioned there's different kinds and some artists whittle their charcoal to a point. I said that I don't like the thinner charcoal sticks because I break them too easily! I offered her my charcoal pencils, but she declined, saying she wanted to practice more.

They all liked the getting dirty part of using charcoal; at the end of class, they really felt like they'd Made Art.

I also set up an easel and my pad of paper and did some drawing at the front of the room, which was new. I do often draw during this session, just not at the easel. There's pros and cons. I don't use easels much, so it's already a bit of hindrance when drawing at the easel. I think I should be doing more demos in general, so I'll probably keep it up.

As usual, we started with still photos, then videos of sleeping animals, then awake ones, then shorter/faster videos.

Sleeping puppies were a hit (we usually stop at the 5 minute mark).

And the kitty cocktail party, of course.

And a particular beaver video from the Oregon Zoo.

A few weeks ago, I went to a trivia night hosted by Tualatin Parks and Rec. It was written and MC'd by an educator for the Parks Department. He'd give us little tidbits related to the questions, sometimes as hints, sometimes as "isn't this interesting." It was really interesting. So I did that a couple of times while watching videos, and the students found it interesting. Sort of a sequel to last week's "Everyone knows about the Arnolfini Portrait; surely I'm boring them."

For the last 15 minutes of class, I asked if they wanted to continue with videos or return to still photos. Photos, lol.

For the still photo portion, I use https://line-of-action.com/ The second time we used it, I forgot to deselect "bones, skulls." So we all had a big shock when a skull flashed on screen! No one was, like, offended or anything, but they didn't want to draw a skull. I pointed out they don't move, and everyone laughed.