Catherine

Last night's life drawing class at SCAC in Brighton was pretty full and the gathered horde of scibblers (including the return of last week's newbie Anton Binder) attempted to capture Catherine's
curves and curls on paper or iPad.
Here are my best attempts.

Emmanuelle!

Last night I went along to the regular Tuesday night life drawing session at the Sussex County Arts Club in Brighton with my old pal and comrade on the boards (and now magician) Anton Binder who hadn't drawn a live model since his art college days back in the dim mists of time. Our model was the inspiring Emmanuelle who was stick thin and could hold a difficult pose like a statue! I've never seen anyone more French and I know a lot of French people! Anton did well and loved the experience. Here are some of my scribblings.

Double Trouble!

I managed to fit in two drawing sessions this week in between packing to move house. The first was part of the Brighton festival and was a Drawing Circus hosted by Jake Spicer incorporating three hours of live music and a host of excellent models in a variety of circus themed costumes. Jack's event are always superbly organised and inspiring as was this one. It took place in the Bosco Theatre beside the Spiegeltent on the Old Stein and the steeply tiered seats gave an excellent view of the varying tableaus as they changed and evolved. I had to leave early, unfortunately, so I missed the fabulous Naomi gyrating on a hoop. Great fun!
The following evening I went to my usual life drawing class hosted by Bill Donohoe at the Sussex County Arts Club where our model was the beautiful and statuesque Kate. She liked my drawings so I gave her one! I'll rephrase that- I donated one to her! That's better!

Constanza

On Wednesday afternoon I went along to the only life drawing session I can find in Palma with fellow artist Alan. Our model was the excellent Constanza whom I've drawn before here. Unlike Brighton they tend to have the same model for months which is fine if she's as good to draw as Constanza but can be boring if she's not. Anyway, It's good to keep practicing so here are my best efforts from the session.

The Drawing Circus- Matisse

I went along last night to the Drawing Circus which is a monthly event held very near where I live. I was only going to stay for an hour or so of the 4 hour session but it was so good and inspiring that I stayed 'til the end. The theme was Matisse and the bar area at The Old Market was colourfully decorated with large cut-out shapes taken from Matisse's famous works. We had four beautiful models-
Frankie, Laura B, Laura N and Clementine who was painted entirely blue which contrasted wonderfully with her curly red hair. And for the final tableau they were joined by the impressive and gorgeous Belle who organised the whole thing. It was great fun and it was a pleasant surprise to see old friend and marvelous puppeteer- Daisy there with her lovely friend Sofia. A great evening's drawing!
Here are my best efforts, some of which I've tickled up in Photoshop.

Naomi, Mimi and Me

My very talented and lovely niece came to Brighton for a couple of days. It was her first visit since she was six (now nineteen) and she loved the place. She's an excellent oil painter (better than I'll ever be) and is starting at Glasgow College of Art in September. I'm sure she'll go far! I arranged a private session with the wonderful Naomi so that Mimi and i could have a chance of drawing together. It was great fun and we all got on swimmingly. Here are my efforts. Mimi will post hers up on her own blog I expect.

Kate Shields

On my birthday, having already celebrated for the previous two nights I went along to the regular Tuesday night session of life drawing at SCAC where our model was the ever fabulous Kate Shields.
It was a hot and clammy night and the assembled stalwarts (including fellow renowned cartoonist and comedy sketch writer Geo Parkin, flamboyant fashion artist Hamza Arcan, fitness instructor and illustrator Alexa Garside, anatomy expert, teacher and animator Jeremy Radvan and lovely new friend and healer Ye Ping Tsim) were wilting a bit but it was a fun session. Here are my best attempts at capturing Kate.

Life drawing in Majorca!

Finally, after 5 years of looking and asking and trying and failing to set one up myself, I've found a life drawing class in Majorca. A friend of a friend took me there yesterday afternoon to try out the regular weekly 2 hour session. I took place in an ancient building in the shadow of Palma's magnificent cathedral and was attended by 7 or 8 men and women who conversed during the poses in Spanish of which I understood very little. Our model was the lovely Leyre who is also an illustrator. There were a few differences to the classes I'm used to in Brighton. NO TEA BREAK!!! and no music which was a shame but after 5 years I'm not complaining! I'm going again next week with another local artist Alan.

Michaela

Last Tuesday night at SCAC here in Brighton we were treated to a drawing session with the fabulous Michaela.
Here are my best efforts from the night.

Shadey ladies

I've been asked to join about a dozen other artists in an exhibition of life drawings to appear in Worthing in March and to that end I wanted to try out a new unified style instead of my usual eclectic mish-mash. I've recently seen two artists' work that has inspired me. Russell Patterson, and american illustrator from the 20s and 30s used a lot of areas of black in his images and modern artist Steve Huston does fabulous work with charcoal. So I decided to try my hand at monochrome images in watercolour and charcoal and these are what I've come up with so far. I'm quite pleased with the way it's looking and the large dark shadows are meant to symbolise the oppressive dark side of our personality or the emotional baggage that we carry around and the naked figure stands for vulnerabilty.
I'm hoping to create some sort of emotional response in the viewer rather than just creating pretty pictures of naked people. I don't think I'm quite there yet but I'm going to keep going and see where it leads me.

Jasmine and Michaela

I had one private session with Jasmine and a SCAC session with Michaela a couple of weeks back but because of the pressure of Christmas deadlines I've only just got around to scanning and posting these and I've had another session since these which I need to scan in too. It's all too much! Can I have 8 more hours in the day please Time Lords?

Zoe

Zoe was our model on Tuesday night at Bill's life drawing session at the SCAC. She's slim and tanned and very goo

d to draw. That night she had a feather in her hair giving her a Native American Indian Squaw look which appealed to me greatly being a bit of a fan of all things Wild West.

2 Lauras

This week I drew 2 different Lauras on 2 consecutive nights.
On Monday at The Farm Tavern a small class of drawers (just me and the organiser) attempted to capture the fabulous Finn- Big Laura and on the Tuesday night at SCAC a full studio tried to capture the long limbed loveliness of Slim Laura.
Here are my best ones.

Jake Spicer's Drawing Circus

The other night I went along to another of Jake Spicer's excellent drawing events.
This time it was in the main hall of The Old Market so there was plenty of room. The event started in the afternoon but I went along to the evening part which ran from 8 to 11. There were 6 model. 5 girls and one guy. They were painted white all over to give a kind of Pierrot effect and their poses were accompanied by an excellent group of musicians playing drifty, ambient music which leant to the relaxed vibe. very enjoyable. Here are my best ones.

Laura the fabulous Finn

Last week on my return from Mallorca I managed to fit in a couple of drawing sessions with Laura the fabulous Finn. One was a private session at my flat with Alexa Garside and the other was at the regular Tuesday night SCAC class. Laura is terrific to draw as she's very tall (6'3"), looks fabulous and can hold a pose like a statue. On top of that she has a great personality. I confess to being slightly smitten.
Hey ho! Dream on!

Rosy, oh, Rosy!

After a couple of weeks in Palma where there seem to be no life drawing classes I returned to Brighton where they are everywhere. Last Monday night, round at Kate Shields' wonderful flat a small group of eager drawers were treated to a modelling session by renowned poet and Russia-o-phile Rosy Carrick.
Here are some of my attempts to capture her loveliness.

Greta

A packed to the gunnels life drawing class last night at The Sussex Arts Club were treated to the sinous modelling skills of Greta. There were some notable newcomers in the class including master designer Nigel Spall, reknowned cartoonist Phil Dobson and expert illustrator and generally fab chap Pete Greenwood, who were all enthused by the experience and keen to repeat it. Here are my best efforts at portraying Greta. And then I'm off to Palma for a few weeks where life drawing classes are as dragon's eggs.

Emma Sandham-King

Monday night's new life drawing session in Kate Shields' fabulous flat in Embassy Court, Brighton was attended by 8 or so artists. Our model was the always wonderful Emma who has more curves than than road in San Fransisco er... the one that curves a lot.
Anyway, here are my best daubings from a great session.

Vicki

Tuesday night's life drawing session at SCAC was a bit quieter than usual as a small but cuddly band of stalwarts gathered to draw our model Vicki. I was feeling a bit dodgy after spending an evening with my mate Paul's brother Adrian who'd picked up something dodgy after falling into a canal in Holland.
Probably psychological but instead of repairing to the local hostilery for much quaffage I went home.
Here are my best Vickis.

Cleo Kate

Last night I returned to my regular Tuesday night life drawing class at The Sussex Arts Club after a break of a few weeks while I was in Hungary and then recovering. Our model was the fabulous Kate who has often been compared to Bettie Page although I think she's more Cleopatra. It was good to see

regular Rich and another returnee, the excellent cartoonist and all round good egg- Geo Parkin. After 2 hour of attempting to capture Kate's pulchritude we repaired to Mrs Fitzherberts for much nattering and quaffage. Ugh my head! here are my best scribblings.