Teaching to Learn

I am not a teacher, have never qualified as one.

But I find that if I really, really want to 

LEARN something well, the best way is for me

to teach it to someone else.  

This precocious 12 year old spent a week of "Auntie Camp" with her twin brother in the mountains of NC.  On her docket was an art lesson with yours truly, a friend of the aunts.  My student listened intently as we went over the concepts of Shape, Contrast, and Color.  We did some continuous line drawing of simple objects as a warm-up and even put on the "magic glasses" to discuss contrast.

Local color (a green tree) versus imaginative color (maybe you prefer it blue?) wound up our prep lesson of basics.  Choosing to paint landscape, this eager student dug through my photos to choose one for her masterpiece.  We were both salivating as the paints and canvas came out on the table; there is always that thrill of anticipation, that lure of the magic, that total sense that something wonderful is about to happen.  I knew she felt this too.

We started by using the 'magic glasses' to identify the darkest passages in the composition and lay them in first.  She was fine with only a few pencil marks as I assured her that using acrylic paints let us make many corrections if needed.  (The oils are a bird of a different feather.) With no hesitation she dipped her brush in and went for it.

All of us tend to gravitate towards painting detail first so I explained to her we were building an icecream sundae and did not want to start with the whipped cream and the cherry.  She got it! Above are the large shapes we referred to as the bananas and ice cream: the basics, the structure, the foundation of what we were building.  Big shapes of the correct color.

And here is my happy camper complete with the whipped cream and finally (see the purple cone flowers?) the cherries on her sundae.  We were both so pleased with her results.  It was with great joy she signed her masterpiece and I dated it on the back.  

So what did the teacher learn in all this??  First, I got a recap of the basics in planning any composition, a review of a few simple elements that are the structure of any piece.  I know I, too, can be guilty of wanting to jump right into the whipped cream and cherries. 

Second, I had the pleasure of observing what sincerity in learning requires: an open mind (never did she argue with me about how she preferred to do something), a willingness to experiment (ok, no idea why you want a yellow blob there but I am going to trust you....oh gosh, it works), repetition of instructions (she had no qualms about talking out loud to herself throughout the process, reminding herself of things I'd said or asking herself what was next, it was a pacing, not a race)  and finally, a satisfaction in the outcome (she had no expectation of not liking her work, she was pleased with herself and enjoyed her result with enthusiasm).  Of course she wants to learn more but setting a bar that can't be met is a sure killer of future progress.

So as my adorable student heads off to art class in "real" school (no doubt repeating to herself: shape, contrast, color), I will go to the studio next week with a mind open to experimentation while I remind myself, out loud, of the basics. And, oh yes, I promise to be excited over the results.

Always Learning,

Cindy

Self Portraits and Contour Lines

Continuous Line meets Contour Line meets
Wire Style Drawing

journal sketch by Carmen Beecher

It was my turn to lead a challenge with my weekly painting gang.  The moans were deafening when I announced "self portraits" and got even louder when I continued "...in wire-like, continuous line drawings with an emphasis on the contour."  But I passed out practice paper and we all got to howling with our first attempts, believe me, for a group discount we would have marched directly to the plastic surgeons office!

I assured the fine ladies that a likeness was not required..."interesting line" was.  Slowly they began to get a bit more adventurous in the drawings and not whine so much about the wrinkles we have been blessed with.  The idea is that once you place your pen on the paper you do not pick it up again until you are finished...thus: drawing with one long,continuous line.  Another way to imagine it is to sculpt the image as if you had one endless piece of wire.  It's a very challenge exercise.

l to r: Carmen Beecher, Carol Schiff, Mary Warnick, (below)

Kathy Garvey, Donna Vines 

MIA: Dennette Schweikert and Fay Picardi

I have learned that I can teach OR produce OR photograph the event...but rarely all three at the same time.  So my final photos are missing the end products of all 6 of us.  Here's a sample however:

l to r top: Cindy practice, Carol,

Carmen, Cindy

I love doing these, the charm of certain elements give them a Picasso-esque flavor while the eye and hand have to really work on capturing shape.  Hopefully we will all continue to work on other subjects with this same technique.

Continuously Yours,

Cindy

Teaching....

Mixing it Up with Mixed Media

I had the opportunity to be teacher for a day with my painting

gang "Pieces of 8."  We do this occasionally to share

new techniques and have a "play date" that encourages work outside our normal m.o.

Believe me, I have a renewed respect for workshop instructors who do

this for a living...it's hard to think, talk, correct, inform and paint all at the same time.

But my students were worthy and just might exceed the abilities of the one

showing them the method!

Here's a recap:

I had prepared masonite boards for everyone with 3 coats of gesso each and sanding between the coats.  I'm not fond of heavy sanding on hardboard as it can eat into the fiber so these were rougher than I usually like.  (Board panels can be made as smooth as glass: lovely to work on!)

We cut shapes from contact paper or masking tape and chose 3 primary colors to

work with.  We glazed and glazed and moved the shapes around and

glazed some more.  It was a lesson in how layering the colors changes the tones you can get from just 3 selections (of red, blue and yellow). 

When everything dries and the contact is peeled off (new lesson learned: contact paper

and hair dryers are not a good combo!) we tackled bringing the shapes forward and

backward using additional paint and graphite.  The pencil marks and the addition

of intentional white acrylic can turn a hodge podge into a focused design.

VOILA!

Kudos to Carmen who took one of my favorite shapes, the pear, and made it into

a lovely mixed media painting. 

It was a fun experience to give a few basic instructions and watch all the different

paintings emerge from the same materials.  I'm a real believer that everytime we play we learn something that will eventually inform an unyet painted masterpiece.

So I'm off to play....err, work!