Thursday night life drawing. This is a chance to work with a model for three hours. Unlike working from a photographic reference, the life drawing room is fluid. For better or for worse, we cannot immediately commit to a cognitive model of our subject. For three hours we are in a very human, liminal space. We are constantly adapting, filtering, adjusting, editing. We meet with our theses, our questions, insecurities, strengths, whatever it is that we bring or encounter during the session. And there is a good change that no resolution will come from the experience.

Something magical can on occasion occur within the drawing group. The other night, my friend Howard was making a marvelous drawing next to me. ‘Well, I better show up also,’ I thought. Whether it is inspiration, camaraderie, energy, group flow – something, sometimes happens that makes me step up my game. The speed and accuracy of my pattern recognition was heightened, new connections were made. Working on difficult things in a group is a wonderful and powerful thing. 

There is a no shortage of information swapping during this three hour process. Information is zipping around on so many levels. With practice and repetition, we can on occasion separate signal from noise. Ideally, sometimes, our channels of receptivity are open and something worthwhile comes of this exchange. On a good night we draw or paint new forms that not only carry information but that affect us, that really hit home and make us feel more deeply human.

Below are drawings and paintings from the month of March. It was another cold one in Cleveland, OH. But the light. Especially around dawn, the light can be like fireworks around here. Not just being hyperbolic here. The morning light is something worth getting out there for.