Artwork by Victor Delclos

Renewal

I have recently retired from a 35-year career as a professor of Educational Psychology teaching and doing research in several universities across the United States. Before that, in my early 20’s, I had taken one life class and I did a number of portraits from photos and a few still life paintings. I found it to be a very fulfilling activity and several folks who have seen that work have been very complementary.

While I enjoyed painting as a hobby, I always felt that I could really do much more if I were to dedicate some serious time to painting and to communicating ideas and understanding through art. Having retired, I now have the time.

I have been interested in the arts since childhood. As a high school student, I read Time-Life Books on countless artists and musicians and became sensitive to the many schools of both through. I visit museums and attend concerts regularly and enjoy learning about the techniques and the expression that goes into art of all kinds. I have played at several musical instruments and, especially in my early adult years, enjoyed painting. My children have encouraged me to return to my easel and have given me a selection of brushes, paints, easels, and other materials to spur me on. I am very excited to return to art as I envision my retirement. The little I have done since retiring in December, mostly reviewing color, value, and basic drawing, has gotten me psyched to take lessons.

Time has been a major challenge; my retirement has potentially removed that as a barrier. In addition, lack of available feedback from a knowledgeable and interested community has made it difficult to restart. I need the discipline of a schedule and the support of critical friends to support my motivation. I have done some online teaching and learning and I think that this course has the potential to provide that help.

I have been brushing up on basic anatomy and experimenting with simple drawings of balls, cans, and everyday objects and am intrigued by the idea of focusing on effects of light and shade and translating them into values and shades to create images. I am excited about my brief attempts and want to learn more. As I understand the approach in this course, I believe it will do exactly what I think I need by offering a clear idea of the goals of drawing from life and providing concrete strategies and targeted feedback to helps me reach those goals.

I know a lot about learning from my career researching teaching and learning and teaching future teachers about how people learn. I have explored a number of community college courses available locally and several painting course books as well as online offerings. When I stumbled upon Drawing Academy in a web search I immediately recognized that this instruction was applying serious learning concepts to an art pedagogy and that it could offer me a great deal in pursuing my dream. The free videos and the commentary on submitted work have already given me insight into seeing in a different way.

Winning this art course would give me an entry into the possibilities before me. I plan to pursue this dream for as long as I am able. I am enrolled in a free portrait class for seniors at a local community college and would like the opportunity to test drive an online course that appears to be an excellent alternative. Comparing these two approaches to learning will help me to plan out my future learning path.

I would like your vote as I move from the front of the classroom, helping others to learn to teach, to a seat in the classroom where I can learn from the wisdom and experience of the instructors at the Drawing Academy. I think that painting can fill a creative spot in my life that has been filled for so long with helping others to learn. I also think that this course can open a long-neglected channel of communication of my insights and ideas to add to the word-based channel I have used for so long.