Go Figure ...

Last Fall we took a self-guided ArTrails Open Studios tour through Bennett Ridge, a rustic, upscale community, full of artists young and old. (http://sonomaarts.com/artrails/) We walked around the studios of jewelers, painters, wooden bowl sculpture-ers ... enjoying all kinds of great (okay, some not so great) artistic expressions.


In one of the studios they had a sign-up sheet for Figure Drawing sessions that were to start up in the winter. We signed up and had our first session this January.

OMG!!! It was a BLAST!!! There were about 15 of us, in a cold garage/studio on a hilltop. (Can you hear "Dueling Banjos" in the background?) No. No banjos, but Miles Davis, Putamayo African-Spanish beat, you know, fantastic eclectic music and the most wonderful live model ever. Startling really.

When we first walked in (we took a wrong turn and arrived a little late), people were already set up and sketching away. The model was boldly standing there like a giant Gaston Lachaise statue — full figured, naked and eminently drawable.

We set up our pads and pencils (next to the pot bellied stove for sure!) and lost ourselves for three hours in the pure joy of putting marks on paper.

The model talked to us at the break (after throwing on a bright purple robe) and told us she was a dancer and had been art modeling for over 15 years. I immediately fell in love with a romantic daydream of how she might live ... an African-American Gypsy Queen whirling through life with gold disk earrings and a mass of tiny braided dreads piled high on her head. I didn't really want to know too much about her, or I might burst my bubble and find out she actually made a living as a myopic billing clerk for an airplane parts company. (No offense to airplane parts billing clerks ... I was one when I was 17. But that's another story.)

Anyway ... here ... peek over our shoulders and have a look at the fun we had ...