Most of the people were for photography. It had about 30 people where as cooking , glass painting, water color etc had almost 5 people each. Yeah, just 5. Art doesn't sell much?
And charcoal painting had only 1 lone pupil, Sindia. The teacher, an old lady, joked to me that I'll get individual tutoring.
We waited for half an hour more hoping that some people might have an enlightenment and join the session. Well, some did have an enlightenment, it seems. As I was wondering whether they would cancel the workshop itself since I was the only one present, two more people joined our workshop.
The session started and she said there are four types of charcoal. 1) powder 2) dry 3) oil based 4)wax based. Wow, I thought, because I wanted to see how they do with the powder. And then she told " For beginners, oil based one is better, today we will try with that." Well, I didn't like that. Then, we got our weapons. Charcoal stick, muslin cloth, tissue, eraser and a piece of paper.
I didn't like charcoal at all. It was nearly impossible to draw a thin line with that brittle thick charcoal piece she gave. I ended up with a pathetic charcoal painting and a disappointed heart. Well, this was not what I expected. Anyway, it reinforced my faith in my pencils.
And here is the painting. Probably the only charcoal painting of my life because I don't intend to touch charcoal anymore.
Done with charcoal . Die, charcoal die.. Pencil Rules!! Pencil is the best!! I love Pencil.
Forgive my dear pencil, for not giving you the respect you always deserved, for the times I abandonded you and went in search of lesser mortals like charcoal. I am coming for you, dear, you are the best :)
-Sindia
Hello,
ReplyDeleteI found your blog while hitting the next blog button from mine. I think it is wonderful that you are provided with creative classes at work.
I also think the drawing you produced looks great especially as it was your first try at it with charcoal. While at university I took a couple of classes where we were only allowed the use of charcoal (mostly powder-based). At that time I used to only draw with pencil and it was difficult at first to work with the much larger sized drawing tool. Eventually I got used to working with charcoal and it helped me produce drawings that showed much stronger dimension. Something pencil alone is more difficult to get. After charcoal I branched out to paint and now like water color on canvas a lot.
Keep trying different types of materials in addition to pencil-it is really good to help you grow flexibility and look at your artwork from new prospectives.
Tina
Tina
Hello Tina,
ReplyDeleteIt is nice to know that you could produce fine charcoal paintings even after finding it difficult at first. Thanks for your encouraging comments. I'll try again with charcoal.
-Sindia
hey, amusing read :) Back to pencils afterall, eh? But the work looks good...truly.
ReplyDelete