What a wonderful group of artists we have in this class!
We started off our lesson discussing the Five Basic Elements to shapes. (Dots, Circles, Straight lines, Curved Lines and Angles) and if we can recognize and draw these five basic shapes, we can draw anything!
We are currently practicing the most important "trick" that all artists must master - to open their Artist's Eyes and transfer what the eye is seeing down through their arm and onto their paper. This takes all artists lots of practice, and soon we will all be able to shut off our "logical" left brain that tells us that "the stripes on the shirt are straight" and draw using our "creative" right brain which allows us to look closer at the shirt and see that the stripes actually curve a bit as they wrap around the arm. We will practice turning on our right brains every time we prepare ourselves to draw.
The majority of the students are working with an impressive level of concentration during our drawing warm-ups. They trust that all this practice will pay off when it comes time to drawing representational objects. (and they're right)
I encourage each student to continue practicing "seeing" things through their artist's eyes. This type of seeing goes beyond the seeing you're doing right now. It's like putting on a pair of magic glasses and suddenly noticing shadows, the way the sunlight passes through a window, and lots of other things most people fail to notice.
Have fun, and draw, draw, draw!
