Drawing Jam: Virtual Again but Still Worthwhile

 

12/11/21 Life drawing during virtual Drawing Jam . . . though my heart wasn't in it.

A year ago when I participated in Gage’s virtual Drawing Jam, I wondered whether we would be able to attend in person again by this December. Sadly, the annual event was once again on Zoom. I so miss the actual community of other artists – both students and instructors. Having to attend virtually yet again seemed even more depressing than last year.

Ellie Doughty uses a variety of pens to add interest and indicate depth.

Still, I made the best of it and attended a wide variety of instructor demos at this free event. (Despite my complaints about the Jam’s virtuality, the one huge benefit of Zoom is the ease of viewing demos well.) One of the best was by urban sketcher and illustrator Eleanor Doughty, 

Ellie adding color.

whose mixed media landscape demo was so much fun to watch! With nearly 90 participants, she had by far the biggest attendance of the demos I saw. In addition to simply enjoying the excellent view of her mark-making techniques using a wide variety of media, I really appreciated when Ellie talked about compositional decisions she made as she was making them. I think some artists compose so intuitively that they forget that students can’t read their minds. I find it immensely helpful to hear what artists are thinking.

Another excellent demo was presented by Ned Mueller, who has been teaching art for 60-some years! One reason I was interested in seeing his demo was that I am considering taking one of his workshops. The first hour was spent talking through a prerecorded video of a portrait he made in Bistre Conte crayon. A major benefit of showing a prerecorded video is that the artist is freer to elaborate without having to interrupt their own process. I appreciated his sense of humor and the vast years of wisdom and teaching experience behind some of his nuggets:

“Don’t draw the flea before you draw the dog.”

“If you get the shapes accurately, you don’t need much detail.”

“Give students what they need, not what they want.”

The latter remark was related to the importance of values, which he felt that most students can barely tolerate studying for more than a week or two before they want to get on with color. He contrasted that to the years that classical drawing students work with monochrome media to understand values before they ever touch paint. “Now that I’ve said that, I’m sure I’ve lost a lot of potential students,” he quipped. (But it made me even more interested in studying with him.)

Ned Mueller showed us numerous examples of his painting process from value study to finished painting.

After the prerecorded portrait demo, he gave a slide presentation showing many examples of how he progresses from a value study to a color study to a finished painting. Mueller said that he might do as many as 20 value studies, from which he’ll choose five options to work from to “cut down on the clunkers.” From there, he might do several color studies before finally making the finished painting. Again, the biggest value in seeing his process was in hearing him talk about how he makes decisions.

Between demos, I did a little life drawing, but my heart wasn’t in it. After finally being able to participate in real life drawing outdoors last summer, going back to Zoom was harder than ever.

As I did last year, I made a donation afterwards to show Gage that I want it to be around for a long time to continue bringing excellent community programs like Drawing Jam.

Dare I say that I hope the Jam will not have to be virtual next year?