terra firma 02 | Page 176

Life Drawing When you’ve never been to a life drawing workshop, you aren’t totally sure what to expect, you only have pre conceived ideas of the flamboyant curvaceous women prancing around a room, or well chiseled men staring at apples in their hands. Situated in large room above an old Church, there were art tables placed around the room in an oval form, with a studio light, small mattress and a red gym matt placed in the middle. It was a nerve-wracking prospect to have someone undress before me, either male or female, but the redheaded woman seemed very friendly and keen, which relaxed everyone in the room. I had to pop out to the loo and when I came back she was stark naked, but thankfully in a position where I could only partly see her breasts. I wasn’t as shocked as I thought I would be, it felt normal, everyone was staring at her and making sketches of her nude body. So I sat down and started with her head, trying desperately to remember my GCSE art lessons. It felt quite relaxing drawing her and it almost didn’t feel like she was naked. Surprisingly, the best part to draw were her breasts, maybe that’s because I have never drawn them before and they are much easier to do than hands and feet! After the first 5 minute pose, we then begun to do shorter ones to get us started and into a flow. So they were as short as 15 seconds, I panicked and before I knew it the time was over and I had nothing on my paper.