The life-drawing class you can take from home #LifeDrawingLive @ Royal Academy

What is #LifeDrawingLive?

It’s a free online life drawing class you can take from anywhere! Life drawing is the artistic tradition of drawing the human body from a live model – something that the likes of Turner and Constable would have studied at the Royal Academy, and which still takes part in our Life Room today. Life drawing can be an important way for artists to hone their skills – but it can have a much wider impact too. It can contribute to a mindful and relaxed state, reduce anxiety, improve problem-solving and encourage new perspectives. It’s also really fun.

On 25 January 2018, with From Life, an exhibition about life drawing, on show in our galleries, we broadcast the world’s first live-streamed, mass participatory life drawing class, led by renowned artist Jonathan Yeo. Featured on BBC Radio 2 for its innovative approach, the class saw artists aged six to 92 – many of whom had never tried life drawing before – tuning in from around the world and picking up their pens, pastels and pencils to sketch the poses of our model, Andrew. Over 700 drawings from participants have been shared across social media, and they’re still coming. Now it’s your turn. #LifeDrawingLive is of course no longer “live” but you can take the class below, just as it happened on the night.



What happens in the class

The full session is 90 minutes long – but you can of course stop and start, or join in for as much or as little of it as you want to. Jonathan Yeo will introduce the class and instruct you throughout: we start with some quick poses for you to draw to warm up, then try some longer poses so you have more time to fine-tune your drawings. Please note: due to social media community standards, this event did not feature full nudity.

What you need

Some paper and a pen or pencil is all you really need to take part – if all you’ve got is a napkin and a biro, that’s just fine – although you could also work with pastels, charcoal or any other materials you want to try. We recommend you watch on a desktop and go full-screen if you can, to get the best possible view of the model.

Share your work

We’d love to see your sketches. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram to share photos of your drawing with the hashtag #LifeDrawingLive. You can see some examples of other participants’ work below. Enjoy the class!



More here www.royalacademy.org