I'm three days late for Thursday Art Club, but it was really just a group drawing session.
When the school kids watch me draw, they always ask me the same old ambiguous question: "Miss Emily, how do you do that?" And I usually have the same old ambiguous answer, "Practice."But what they're really asking me is, "Where do I even begin to learn how to do that?" So on Thursday, I gave them a beginning, with a lesson on tracing. Luckily I had a small group. Not that I would have minded a large group, but I really got to have a heart-to-heart with them, and that is a better measure of success than high numbers, in my opinion.
I told them about myself when I was young: Lots of imagination, a great love for comic art, and an overwhelming need to be "good at drawing." I used to find my favorite poses in my old Amazing Spider-Man comics and trace them. I loved seeing the lines without the color; they helped me understand what the original artists saw before their artwork became books. Long story short--and I was sure to stress point this to the kids-- tracing got boring. I got tired of drawing something I couldn't really be proud of, because it wasn't mine. And that's when I realized that if I could trace it, I could draw it on my own.
And that was our day. I had lots of Batman and Batgirl coloring sheets from an old coloring book they keep at the school, so the kids had lots of interesting poses to trace and re-purpose.
^_^
As for me, I've been doing what I always do in my spare time...sketching, painting, watching cartoons, and photographing Johnny ink his latest project. (More on that soon!)
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