Free Drawing School Online Challenge by Mark Aerial Waller

Join the Free Drawing School live online every Monday at 10am.

A different drawing challenge is announced each week for you to get involved with at home between 10am-12pm guided live with an artist.

The Free Drawing School Online continues over the summer with many more challenges as we invite lots of guest artists to design the weekly challenge for you to join in with.

The Free Drawing School challenges are designed to be done at home with the resources you can bring together from your drawers and cupboards.

Details
The details of the challenge will be announced here and on social media at 10.00am.

You will have two hours in which to complete the challenge and post your work either in the comments on the Facebook event for others to see or on twitter or instagram with the hashtag #freedrawingschool.

You can also email your outcomes to volunteer@hospitalfield.org.uk

The Free Drawing School is made possible with generous funding support from The Robertson Trust and The National Heritage Lottery Fund.

Monday 8 June, 10am-12pm

This week’s Drawing Challenge is led by Mark Aerial Waller. Mark Aerial Waller is an artist based in London. His work integrates objects, video and live performance. He studied film and video with sculpture at St Martins School of Art. Waller founded the event based project The Wayward Canon in 2001; there is currently a selected retrospective exhibition at CAAM Las Palmas. His films are distributed by LUX, London and he is represented by Rodeo. Mark was part of the Summer Residency at Hospitalfield in 2017.

“Hello, I look forward to drawing with you next week.

You will be drawing between a plant you have in the house and one of your favourite household ornaments or keepsakes. We will be exploring overlapping and imaginative drawing. So if you don’t have a houseplant, you could get one for next week. Succulents are really easy to look after and are not likely to cause hayfever etc. Also we could peg the drawings up to make a scene, so some clips or some masking tape would be useful. Apart from that any kind of drawing implement on paper.

Have a good week!

Best wishes,

Mark”

Image credit

1. Detail from Change of Circumstance, 2010, Mark Aerial Waller, courtesy of the artist.

2. Bio pic of artist Mark Aerial Waller

“Welcome to Hospitalfield’s Free Drawing School,

 My name is Mark Aerial Waller and thanks very much for inviting me. This morning we are going to try something new…for me…hopefully new for you too.

I generally make video art, a few years ago a made a video where I cut out photocopies of people blown up to full size, that I stuck in the room and walked around with the camera. Being surrounded by things you make causes us to enter an unusual imaginative situation. We we can create environments for ourselves beyond our furniture. In some ways it’s a bit like a garden,we can explore and discover new things by walking around the garden. It’s a site for imagination. So I was hoping we might make something like that for ourselves to have in the house.

So, I have chosen a house plant. I chose it because I like it and because I want to draw the nice sweeps  it has.  It won’t be too fussy. I wanted to make drawings that had broad strokes that weren’t too fiddly to do. Just to move your arms. The other thing I have is a keepsake, to stimulate personal imagination. If you could find something that you have around the house or tucked away at the back of a drawer, something you have enjoyed having and looked at over the years, or maybe your whole life. For instance, I found this object in the drawer of my grandmother’s desk when I was about five. It’s a paperweight and it’s depicting the room in which Robert Burns was born. I was always fascinated by it, just because it has a nice shape and it acts as a lens and also there are all these things to explore, there is a pot and a grandfather clock in the corner. There’s lots to explore. So I want to draw something from the object and the plant, to explore them through drawing then mix them and bring in some kind of imagination.

So key things to make this imagination you will need: 

1. A plant and an object that you love, that have connections to yourself and your past
2. Trying using a new drawing material. (A note on paper and pens; if you usually use graphite pencil, then maybe use a biro or a felt tip. Just try something you wouldn’t normally use, something that is your second choice. If you haven’t got any big paper paper, maybe stick a couple of pieces together. So you have more movement.)
3. Complete four, ten minute drawings to start with, two of the plant then two of the keepsake.
4. Next we we will arrange these four drawings around us and make a fifth drawing which is an overlap of all these things that will be quite chaotic.
5. Make a little scene with your drawings, stick them on chairs or furniture and move them around them around. The idea is to make a little garden, move them around and hide bits.
6. Try to use this to make a new drawing, through these drawings! Think about an overlap, draw some sections of the keepsake through the plant, this should take about 20-30 mins. Don’t worry too much about the times as we inevitably run over.

Enjoy yourself!”

Share what you have made using the #freedrawingschool or email to volunteer@hospitalfield.org.uk