This is an introductory course in beginning drawing designed for the student with little experience in studio art as well as the student with previously attained drawing skills and ambitions. In the course we will learn various strategies and techniques for making drawings. More fundamentally we will discover a more acute ability to see using the art of drawing.
Primarily the course will focus on drawing from observation. What we see and what we think we see may be different things. We will work on understanding strategic methods for making a drawing. Including the careful discovery of the qualities of light and dark, how shapes create space, and how individual realities can be realized in a drawing. You may have noticed that here in Siena the light is always changing with dramatic effects, that the space created by the medieval architecture is dynamic, fluid, and not static. The qualities of light and shadow, the closeness of the streets and the openings into the various piazze can be psychologically quite profound. We will experience that dynamic space and more clearly understand it by use of drawing and I think we may have a lot of fun while we are at it.
The human form as it inhabits a particular space will also be one of our subjects. We will begin with simple assignments or conditions and as subsequent powers begin to develop we will become more curious, ambitious and sensitive to things inside and outside the act of drawing.
Success in this course is in no way dependent upon “innate talent” but is insured by a thorough involvement with all aspects of the class and a progressive development of critical visual thought through the act of drawing.