The Joy of Life Drawing

Writing a blog about art and the arts is always satisfying, intriguing, exciting and often surprising and I feel incredibly lucky that I get the opportunity to see many art previews/exhibitions etc. But I often leave thinking "I must get out my own pencils/paints/charcoal and another week slips by and I have done nothing about it.
However, this year I am determined to make time for more sketching and painting and hope to do a couple of art sessions a month. So far so good. Earlier in January I went to the wonderful Lavender Hill Studios in Clapham and spent 3 very happy hours drawing at one of their Wednesday drop in life drawing classes. There is no tutoring as such but being amongst some very good artists with a brilliant life model is incredibly uplifting and it inspired me to do more.

Closer to home I spent yesterday morning down at the local village hall where a student of the above mentioned Lavender studios has set up a monthly drop in session for local artists, again with a life model. The light in the hall was wonderful yesterday, in fact it was the first sunshine for about 10 days and through drawing and observing the light I really noticed it. We had a beautiful model and over a dozen keen artists turned up, despite the still snow packed roads. Some people were clearly experienced artists and some had never tried before but the shared skills and convivial encouragement of the group resulted in a very creative and happy morning for all.