Angie Rogers 'Winter Calligraphy' charcoal drawings
Well its been a pretty slow and uneventful start to the year at Brooklyn, with many artists opting to work at home, some members away on their travels (Hello to Hannah down in the South Atlantic and enjoying sightings of blue whales!) and some poor folks struck down with lurgy (hope Lynda is feeling a lot better now).
However, we’ve just had 4 new giant tanks of gas delivered, so its not completely unfeasible to imagine the studio temperature rising above freezing and possibly even heading towards toasty warm? Hopefully this news will encourage a surge of creative energy. And to get people in the mood why not get involved with a February drawing project called 28 Drawings Later?
Glasgow based artist Victoria Evans made a public commitment online to create one drawing per day during the month of February in 2011. She named her artistic endeavour 28 Drawings Later. Her February drawing challenge was conceived to help improve her own skills but as the online community around her engaged with the project and wanted to join in too, Victoria found the sense of community around drawing and art was just as important as her creative progress. The result was an evolving, month-long, participatory online gallery which encouraged everyone, artists and non-artists alike, to see what might happen if they made time to draw every day for a month.
This year, with sponsorship from Millers Creativity Shop and Aye-Aye Books as well as some clever, creative use of Facebook, Victoria is opening 28 Drawings Later to an even wider audience. Participants in the inclusive arts project will share their daily drawings with the 28 Drawings Later Facebook profile page and receive feedback and comments from other members of the community. Dedicated drawers will even be able to win prizes as reward for their contributions. Victoria urges everyone, to take part: “From stickmen characters to intricate sketches, regardless of style or ability, I believe anyone can learn to express themselves through drawing once they stop worrying about making mistakes and ‘getting it right’”.
In celebration of the 2012 leap year, 28 Drawings Later will culminate in an offline exhibition of work at The Old Hairdressers in Glasgow City Centre. Anyone who successfully completes the online challenge will be invited to exhibit their work.
To take part, just ‘like’ the 28 Drawings Later Facebook page and begin drawing on 1 February! http://www.facebook.com/28DrawingsLater
Brooklyn member Angie Rogers has decided to take the challenge and hopes other Brooklynites will join her. If anyone is put off by the Facebook aspect, Angie has volunteered to offer technical support.
