Color Me Wonderful

As part of the Summer of Jenn initiative, I have decided to take a drawing class. I didn't feel like drawing left handed with my eyes closed like all of those beginner courses require (since I am such an experienced artist and all, I am way beyond blind contour drawings of my hand), but wasn't quite up for all that the Intermediate and Advanced levels entailed (I am not really sure what they entailed, but I would rather be safe than sorry), so I opted for a class entitled "Drawing with Color."

The First Class:
So, on Day 1 I go into the class equipped with my prismacolor pencils and a smile. (Actually, I wasn't really smiling, I just wanted you to know I was really excited to be there). Our teacher comes in and first informs us she is going to be "a little bit crazy" due to the fact she teaches art in an elementary school and it is the last week of classes. She failed to let us know that "a little bit crazy" in elementary school art teacher speak actually means "a lot crazy" in normal person language. Fortunately, this is not a wasted course. In that first class, I learned a lot, including, but not limited to, the following:

1. Always feel the paper before you buy.
2. Always feel the colors before you buy.
3. When drawing with colors, draw with feeling and from the inside out.
4. Oil pastels are the best choice of color.
5. The oil pastels that feel like lipstick are of the best quality, however, they melt when it is summer. They are perfect in the winter, though. (It was at this point in the lesson that my new best friend forever, Edith, started to pretend her oil pastels were lipsticks).
6. Colored pencil is too linear to really demonstrate the body and life of colors.
7. The last week of school makes teachers crazy.
8. Ochre is Edith's favorite color because it matches her shirt.
9. Homework, is not only optional, but also required. But really optional. But you should do the homework, not because it is required, but because it is fun.
10. BU has the worst art school ever. (If you went to BU for Art, my teacher probably doesn't like you.)

The Second Class:
This time, I came better prepared. [I picked up some oil pastels on the way in (at the art store I made a new friend who helped me pick out a good set. I told him that I didn't really like oil pastels that much because they are too chunky but I was being forced to use them for a class. He made me try-and feel- every type they had and we settled on the superior quality cray pas not because they were the best or the worst, but because I said "Cray pas! I had these in elementary school." We both felt that the memory of elementary school art might make me like oil pastels more than some stuffy brand. Plus, they were the closest I could get to the lipstick consistency without spending all of my money).]

Once in class I sat next to Edith again, because as I said before, we are now art class BFFs. She showed me what she worked on over the weekend. I said I liked it. Then she asked me if I was liking the oil pastels. I said, not really, I still like colored pencils best. She replied with, "Why? You like being in control?" Touche, Edith, touche.

The assignment du jour was to blend colors together. We had to use either oil pastels or regular pastels. Since I had gone out and bought the oil pastels I thought I might as well use them. So I went about the task of blending my limited palette of colors with one another. What I created was actually stripes of colorful browns (if you can imagine that). It looked a lot like shit. Then, we had to go around the room and look at everyone's color blends. When the teacher got to mine, she oohed and ahhhed and said how much she loved it. Then she made everyone gather round to ogle my apparently lovely brown stripes and describe the beautiful colors that were on there. One girl said one of the colors looked like New Mexico. The teacher told her that wasn't a color, did anyone see an actual color? Everyone was quiet so I said "Brown?" That wasn't a good answer, either, apparently-- although Edith chuckled with her French Canadian accent. (The correct answers were Taupe, Olive, Ochre, and Burnt Sienna.) The whole scenario reminded me of Freshman year "I want to blow" (another story for another day, perhaps). Incidentally, I am a fantastic blender of colors, and if this course was graded I would probably get an A.

Things I learned:
1. Brown is not brown.
2. If you think it is ugly, you are probably wrong.
3. Picasso was never good with color.
4. Oil pastels suck.
5. New Mexico is not a color, it is a state.
6. Cray Pas is fun to say.