Mather Senior Art Classes

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October/November: Catch Up Mather Senior Art Classes

Here's my catch-up on my classes with Mather Creative Mindfulness Classes. I haven't been able to participate with them all. But here is a smattering of some of the fun and relaxing work.

Mather Senior Art Classes which are FREE

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My Creative Mindfulness Classes are really fun...each month a theme is announced and we get tips/art history, examples of some type of art/themses/techniques that can be quickly done in about 35 min.

Each month there is a theme, November is Portraits.

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Here is the Mather handout with examples. We were encouraged to select a face portrait from a magazine, artwork or personal photos. Cut it out and paste on a sheet

 of Sketchbook paper.

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I chose to work with one of my iconic Barbie photos. BMR, as I call her is a no.3 doll from 1959-60. She has the softer face. I actually followed the lines of the curvatures in her face/features to draw my first extension lines, like here.

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This is a similar photo. The free line extensions actually originate somewhere from her face. IE: the hairline, the line in the mouth, chin, eyelids, etc. I think the secret to this is don't think too much and just extend the lines in a sweeping quick motion.

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Once the lines are established, you do them in dark marker. 

The Zentangle fill ins.

• Definition

  Zentangle is a relaxing art technique that uses repetitive patterns to create structured images. The word "Zentangle" comes from the words "zen" and "tangle".  

Once your shapes are established and the original lines are dark, you see the spaces, which you fill with repetitive designs. The fun part is to not worry about what the end result will be. The only thing I really did that directly related to the photo was the hair...surprisingly this is all very relaxing and fun, goes quickly because once you make a line or design, the rest of the space is determined.

I worked on quality sketch paper, a Sharpie, and a smaller sharpie pen with this one. I did rouge her face with some colored pencil, but restrained from adding more color to this one. Barbie does have a touch of a Renaissance collar here, but I was only extending or echoing the original shape.  This ended up inkling Elizabeth the I...but then BMR would make a great Elizabeth. There was bleed through with good markers, so I always have an extra paper protecting the next page in my sketch book.

Last Week another portrait.

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Mather Class Handout

The next week's portrait prompt. A little discussion about Picasso and how he dissected and reassembled faces in his work. Here we used a  technique where an oval was drawn for a face, then other large intersecting shapes (Oval, Square, triangle, diamond, etc.)were added in marker, then some facial features added/or not and patterning inside the shapes. We were encouraged to be free in our placements.

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I chose to work with color in this one, once all my intersecting lines were done. I had no idea who or what this person was...

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I was freer with this one, and really just played. One eye was upside down, the nose exaggerated and stretched sidewards. The planes of the face ended up being part of the loops and shapes we freely drew.

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While interesting, the figure seemed to be just floating...I grounded the head with the left triangle below the ear in dark, that helped, Then I wanted to balance the dark into the upper right corner. I started scribbling stars, we were at the end of our time, so very fast. Then I colored in those sections with a deep midnight blue.

Totally unplanned my gentleman/woman gazing at the stars became 

"Copernicus meets Picasso". 

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My 5-Below alcohol markers bleed through the paper, and here is my 'ghost' sheet to protect my sketch book. This was interesting and fun.

October's Theme was TEXT ART, again with some interesting applications. I have already shown you examples of this in a previous post,

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HERE.

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I think this was the most controlled example we have had this Fall, numbers and letters.

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I'm a lousy direction follower, but really try to do what the prompts are. It is amazing to see all the different results from the same prompts within the class participants. 

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A GRID, Numbers, Letters and intersecting shapes...wow!

Coming up with different designs in the grid boxes was the hardest part, but working within a short time 35-40 minutes is a challenge. I did do the frame and some of the colors after class, in order to bring out the letters and numbers...otherwise it was quite a jumble. Another fun project.

Mid-September I had a Surrealism class, which was quick and I worked in colored pencils, markers and drawing pencils.

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The Mather handout and example from Joan Miro.

We were encouraged to basically scribble/fill the page, add color just free, a no subject matter drawing experience.  Drawing with images/lines/squiggles, as well as color, blank spaces and blocks of color. 

I think of it as 'Ouija Board Drawing'. Your hand is connected to your brain, whether you are conscious of it or not...so---this sort of drawing is a peek into your brain and maybe even unconscious emotions?????????

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I remember I had thought of a peacock, but then went off on a tangent with this, just having some fun with the new markers...and was working very fast. 

Too much fun!

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This one was really fast, I actually started before class and finished this later.  When I take photos of sections of these art pieces they are quite interesting blown up. I may cut this up and use it in some multimedia piece. The cool part is you can enlarge and print and reassemble...? 

Then the Automatic Drawing class started.

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During class I worked with new colored pencils (soft PrismaColor set-not quite chalk like but blendable), Sharpies, Drawing pencils, Charcoal pencil and Alcohol markers. 

 I was just having fun with the different media...and shapes, think: unintentional scribbling, LOL. When I was working, I was spinning the piece around to not rub the soft pencils/charcoal with my hand/arm. 

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And I found, I liked this piece better on the landscape side, when I look at it this way I see something entirely different. 

Mather Senior Art Classes which are FREE

Fun with shapes, lines and COLORs...gosh I love these classes.

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 Sandi Magle

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Dipping my Toe into Surrealism, or was it a Frog Foot

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Happy September, Im not going to say FALL because 80-90's are not FALL. It isn't pumpkin time at all, my pumpkins are far from orange....and WALLY WORLD is putting out Christmas....Jiminy! 

We did have three lovely 70's days...and got a ton of neglected yard work done, but this is NOT FALL, other than dead flowers, we are as green as we can keep the sprinklers going. After a long, hot, wet summer everything demands water to stay green. The payment for gush-gush growth and greenery.

I'm taking another Mather art class, it's called Creative Mindfulness, an hour online one class a week. They are free and many open to outside of Illinois now.

 Mather Institute for Aging programs

This month of September we xwill be emphasizing Surrealism type art projects.  The Surrealists movement was created by a core of artists in the early 20th century all through the 70-80's. They let their imaginations go and also touched on their own or projected subconscious thoughts. One of the most recognizable Surrealist was Salvador Dali. 

Persistence of Memory Slavador Dali from Steemit

Much of the Surrealist Art is still under copyright, so I'm  not going to continue with anymore examples. 

You can follow the link with this painting and view all his introspective work, which is haunting and beautiful in a wonderfully weird way.

For right now, I find the classes I'm taking as adding an asset to my creative skillset and very relaxing and meditative to begin with. This class always with starts breathing, and then with a prompt and some art history for a quick project in your choice of media. 

Since right now, for health reasons I'm taking it very easy, it's fun to play in a meditative way. 

September Week 1-The Exquisite Corpse the name of this project. 
(First, CLEAR your mind of anything in particular) and we started with a fresh piece of any kind of drawing/craft paper.  Fold in half horizontally, then in half again the same way.  From the folds, make them into an accordion fold, then I taped the edges on the sides down and just view and work on the very top fold. 

Fold one: will be a Head or Top of the drawing,
Fold two: will be the Torso or Middle of the drawing.
Fold three: will be the lower Body or the lower section of the drawing.
Fold four: will be the Feet or Base of the the drawing.

The plan...

I had just viewed the pond that morning, so a goldfish came to mind---as we have had them, but then they are basically there to feed the raccoons, so now we don't. 

But I still think of it as a fish/frog pond.

The point was to do all sections into a complete drawing in 30 minutes or so, so 7-8 minutes a section. You work on each section separate without the other bits showing---using some reference points only when you flip to the next section.

The top section was my pond's goldfish, and I'm a also a Pisces, and a Fishmonger's daughter.

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Ok...Fish have scales, so the second section became arms holding scales????

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I know when you empty your mind and follow unconscious thoughts, it may be a trip down a rabbit hole. We were prompted when to move on...so you don't have much time to ponder. What would a Goldfish weigh?----an enemy bird ? and  a friendly fish---totally???? 

So thinking of Greek scales and LIBRA, weighing the worth of it all. I continued,  the armbands had a St. George cross, I'm Danish so I thought one was a Dannebrog (Danish Flag) the other the Red Cross which ......

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...which made me think of wars?

The third section I had started with a skirt for back to school, and Doc Martin boot tops, (my grand's favorite style) but the news from the morning---and they were talking about Gaza. (I erased a swath clean across the skirt) and suddenly it was a Greek or Roman (I know they have nothing to do with Gaza) so a men's skirt and a huge sword, and of course laced sandals and hairy knees.

 Following my erratic thoughts, I dashed off some buildings on the right and a scribble of palm trees on the left.

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Already time to move on to the fourth fold. A bit rattled, I was thinking of History---and if we don't know History, (history is wars) we will be doomed to repeat it. 

History to me, means books. But, keeping with the pond and water... again frogs came to mind..(we had two all summer, and now they are in the foliage), so one leg ended with a frog 'foot' on top of floating books. But, the other 'foot' became a boat and on lots of choppy water. 

BOOKS are important...so the whole 'corpse' is standing on history books, but with another foot in a boat ready to float away, no wonder she looks puzzled.

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My mind, when it gets going---really gets going. 

I wasn't sure what the circles in the boat might be. Class was almost over----so, we shared our drawings and thought processes and were encouraged to make them as complete as we wanted to. I had a new set of alcohol markers (I love they are square and so easy to hold), so I colored it all in, another 30 minutes or so...this is a process project not a finished product project. So I just went at it.

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She's such a harmless goldfish....definitely a she (me?)

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The bird on the right is hard to see now, but the fishy(left) is sleeping or is lunch, not sure. For some reason the toga became an unraveling shawl, and the armbands Denmark and the Red Cross? If she is Female---maybe the weighing of enemies/friends.  The arms are one a frogs and one a pink gloved hand with a rock on its finger, then I thought maybe not female? 

YIKES.

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Now the skirt wasn't plaid, but the palm trees and buildings show up with sand. The sword is a copy of my swords from the Thief of Bagdad project...in my doll blog---search Thief of Bagdad, to the right

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History books, water, boat and for some reason all the circles in the boat are now small froggies? Refugees...going weird again,  Red banners mean they aren't going to war...phew...I don't want to start WWIII. 

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Here is is all together, so now I imagine you are confused, but so am I. 

Fun project, could be a great game--finish a section and then pass to the next person. Start as many as you have people...and an egg timer...ha!

From a Crazy Antiquer, gardener, doll collector,  disturbing ARTisT?.. who just

totally dropped off the E

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                                                                     E....

Paper used, 60# mixed media sketchbook paper

Pencils, 2B and 4B. 

white art eraser

Markers: 18 count dual tip by 1616 Holdings, inc and available at Five Below online. (I really like the design of these---they are squarish and comfortable to hold in arthritic hands---giving me more control with less force and with little smell.) 

I would love a huge set, but first I'm going to do another post on the markers. I need to do some experiments with them...but they were very inexpensive and really worked well. There was considerable bleed thru on my 60# paper---but I just worked on cardboard as a base.

Until then, stay cool, forget the pumpkins, they are just going to rot in this weather, Sandi

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Sandi