My goal in this course is to bring out the artistic sensibilities of the students. To help them discover their aesthetic sense of balance, beauty and form. She can’t really be an art therapist unless she has artistic sensibilities within her. We make decisions everyday about balancing the contents of the day, not always done beautifully but with a sense of proportion and correct form. No one wants their day to be like a Jackson Pollack painting, with no center, no focus and little composition, just energy going this way or that. A day is best when there is some substructure to it that we can then work from.
It is this working substructure of experience and knowledge that the everyday world and a work of creativity share. Both come from a sense of intention and discipline, one deals with function, the other aesthetics. One is in the world, while the latter reflects it in some way, shape or form. Just as the everyday has value, color and composition in it that give meaning to existence, the very same principles apply to the creation of a piece of Art, be it in the plastic arts or music, poetry, architecture or movement. This is because they all stem from the same source, the Being of Humanity. Of contention right now is what view of Man are we working from.
Brief overview of course and importance of the ‘process’ of creativity in general. (I am assuming that the structure of the 3 fold man will have been discussed in the more academic portions of this program) What is the etheric and why incorporate it into an artistic process? How does one do that? Steiner’s comment to look for what lies between things, between forms, to find the living etheric forces that create them.
The act of seeing, what does it mean to SEE something? Drawing as a form of visual thinking.
In this basic course I will cover the elements of drawing, i.e., line, value and form or composition, all from the perspective of dynamic balance and proportion. I won’t be covering the therapeutic aspects of these qualities but want them to experience that the conscious working of these properties has a regenerative effect on their sense of self. This is therapeutic in a general sense of the word.
My goal here is to give students a working understanding of two-dimensional imaginary space. An emphasis will be placed on the importance of light and darkness and the space they weave together. They already have a visual, if unconscious, understanding of how it works, the goal is to bring it to an aesthetic experience and understanding. The healers must first heal themselves.
There will be exercises in slant line drawing, crosshatch drawing, charcoal atmosphere drawing and contour line drawing. There will be graphic design exercises requiring cut out pieces of paper (B&W) where composition will be worked on. Much of the imagery will be in a landscape format as landscapes are an image everyone has in their memories.
Students will need a 9” X 12” (approximate) drawing pad, pencils, HB, 2B, kneaded erasers, scissors, black & white construction paper,fine or medium point black marker and some quick release tape if they want white edges around the borders of their exercises.
Charles Andrade
Charles paints in the colorist style that he evolved from his initial training in England at Tobias School of Art & Therapy. His paintings can be found in private collections in North America, Europe, and New Zealand. Charles owns and operates Lazure Custom Wall Designs, a mural and decorative painting business specializing in Lazure, a unique European glazing finish that creates healing inner environments. Charles teaches fine art classes and offers Lazure and painting workshops worldwide.
