London Drawing at Tate Modern

2 pictures copywrite of London Drawing














What: Life drawing with a difference

Level: Accessible to beginners and artists alike

Where & when: Tate Modern galleries on Monday evenings from 18.45–20.45. 19th October- Monday 30th November

How much: £20 for one session

My friend Lucie and I spent Monday evening in the Warhol room at the Tate taking part in London Drawing's fresh take on the standard life drawing class.

Kicking off with juice and biscuits (a delight), we were taken into the Andy Warhol and then Jeff Koon rooms in which naked women with stars on their nipples were posing. Our two tutors Anne Noble-Partridge and David Price gave us shorts talks on the artists to get us into their mindsets and asked us to create something that played on those themes and captured the essence of whichever room we chose to create in. We were asked not to get hung up on trying to draw the model in front of us, but to embrace the materials they had provided us with (coloured paper, magazines etc) and perhaps focus on particular elements that drew our attention, or particular styles of representation such as repetition.

The 2 hours we had sped by in no time and if anything, they could do with making the course a little longer to include time to go round the galleries to inspire us out of our day-at-work-heads. Going round looking at everyone's wildly varied art at the end, it was clear that there was a whole range of different abilities and personalities - clearly we all got truly into the spirit of the class. Lucie went for sillhouettes and 3D, and now has it hung proudly on her wall. Mine is abandoned half fallen behind a radiator because it turned out a bit crap. But I had fun doing it!

We walked home with a girl we met at the class called Joanne - another lovely bonus of going to classes like this. She's a jewelry designer who was looking for fresh ideas. Here she is and what she had to say:

"Pop art isn't very me, but the tutor explained ways to make it work for you... I just did my thing with bolder colours and lines... I loved it"

And here's what Anne, one of the tutors, has to say about it:

Our goal:
London Drawing aims to radically reinvent the traditional concept ofdrawing from life through producing unique drawing workshops, which areengaging, inspiring and entirely relevant to contemporary practice.

What we want people to gain from our workshops:
We hope to encourage participants of all levels of ability to useunconventional materials and approaches to explore their own visuallanguage. We aim to provide a creative, fun environment where participantsare encouraged to 'think like an artist' in workshops which are arecompletely accessible - working on the premise that no skills or drawing experience are needed to make strong and exciting work.

To book classes in the future, follow this link: http://www.tate.org.uk/modern/eventseducation/coursesworkshops/19597.htm

To check out the other great looking classes London drawing offer, follow this:

http://www.londondrawing.com/