Therapy

As part of regaining some measure of balance in my life I have started going to a life drawing class once a week. I never did any of this sort of thing during my degree (although I probably should have done) so it has all been a bit daunting.

To test myself further and go even more out of my comfort zone I asked for a set of crayons rather pencils for my birthday. Pencils have a precision that is comforting. You draw hard edges in the main which is what i am used to when visualising buildings. Crayons however bring two different aspects - colour and tone. Both are difficult. Showing shape with tone is a whole different ball game for me. I find it very difficult and am constantly reverting to drawing edges. Slowly though my lines are getting freer and more expressive. I am also slowly exploring how different colours go together. Mainly when looking at shadows but also when capturing the negative space around the models.

The classes are for two hours on a Monday evening and involve a range of poses from 2 minutes to 30 minutes. The time flies as I am concentrating frantically for the whole two hours trying to make my blobs look more human like. It is amazing at how sensitive the eye is when the proportions of the body are out slightly. You can see it looks wrong but it is often quite hard to be specific about what needs to be changed to make it look right.

Michael has been deeply worried when he found out i also have to sometimes draw naked men. "Yes I can see all their bits Michael". That said most of my attempts have been quite sexless as there is usually a white patch where their genitals should be. It is hard enough to get the arms and legs looking right let alone the dangly bits.

I am not the worst one there and i am finding it very relaxing. Focusing completely on something quite different from work is very therapeutic