Bottoms up to hen parties
Inotice some of the (many) hen party activities advertised for young brides to be and their attendants in our fair city include life drawing.
I suppose that’s a little more creative than just shrieking over a bottle of prosecco, and I imagine it involves a scantily dressed hunky young man or two somewhere along the line. Ooh matron!
My first experience of life drawing was in the sixth form. I’m sure we were still underage for such things, but we used to cart our drawing boards to the local tech every Wednesday evening.
Sometimes the models were fully tutu-clad dancers from the local ballet company, and it was easy to get away with scribbling multiple layers of tulle.
But usually we got the real thing and my mates and I hardly knew where to look!
The other participants were a mixture of middle-aged bespectacled ladies who executed bold charcoal expressionistic swirls that belied their modest appearance, and dodgy, slightly sweaty-browed old men who certainly did know where to look.
By the time I got to art school, we were used to sitting round in our breaks chatting to completely naked strangers.
Cheating with random ballet dresses is one thing, but the human body generally has the thigh bone connected to the hip bone and so on, and to express that accurately with nothing but an HB pencil takes a deal of skill and practice.
Sometimes we had lightning action poses, but mostly it was a case of hour upon hour of solid concentration on a motionless figure. It certainly taught one how to look.
Our tutor, who was a famous artist in his own right, once remonstrated with me that I’d spent more time drawing the model’s two-bar electric fire than I had on her impressive torso.
Personally, I thought the electric cable snaking towards the observer gave my picture depth.
Sitting naked in front of a class of aspiring artists is a funny sort of job. Some of the models never even glanced at our work, while others wandered round and gave their honest opinions of our efforts which was less intimidating than having ‘the famous one’ breathing down one’s neck and spouting on about objective marks.
Naturally we had some eccentric models. One fellow would frequently change his posing pouch, whether floral, striped or even sequinned, engendering much frantic use of the eraser every time he emerged from behind his modesty screen. Another would appear every Easter with a folding crucifix, so you can imagine what the poses would be that afternoon! Let’s say less variety than usual.
Why draw the naked body at all you ask? Well, with the human body you just can’t cheat and once you have connected all those dry bones, as the old song suggests, your next drawing of a ballerina will stand firmly on the ground, everything in place.
She won’t just be a froth of net and satin, but she’ll have balance and movement…and life!
Not sure if that’s what the hens have in mind though…
Ralph Oswick was artistic director of Natural Theatre for 45 years and is now an active patron of Bath Comedy Festival