I love Living Social and Groupon for their great deals. I have tried countless activities from them. By far I was most excited about my Living Social deal for Michiyo’s Art Studio in New York. It was my Christmas present from my husband and daughter. I had meant to use it earlier but the holidays and frigid weather kept me at bay. I finally booked the sessions because the expiration date was at the end of the month. I was fortunate to have done a double booking to use the coupon fully. I did the Intro to Drawing and Intro to Watercolor classes. Michiyo Fukushima is a master at watercolor.
I hadn’t taken a drawing course since high school. I never realized how exact drawing is – sure I modeled mechanical parts to the hundredths but that’s what computers are for. Okay we weren’t THAT exact but we got pretty technical. I don’t remember high school pushing us to be so exacting. Then again it was a generic art class so we were trying all sorts of styles and not focusing on one. I was used to drawing freestyle and not holding myself to higher standards.
Michiyo pushes you to look and see.
What I learned at Intro to Drawing:
- What the alphanumerics on the pencils mean. I sort of knew but it was nice to ask her anyway and get it straight in my head.
- To start, draw with an “HB” pencil with light pressure. Harder pencils will scratch the paper. Learned that the hard way. I also have a pretty heavy hand.
- Use a kneaded eraser. It is less mess and lets you blot.
- Use your pencil as your level to help you see angles of perspective.
- Perspective – Michiyo told me a line I drew down was in fact going up. I didn’t believe her until she drew some angles of perspective for me. It was a very slight angle but I swore that line was going down! She was in fact, right. My eye needs lots of training.
- Balance – I got consumed on one aspect of the drawing (on more than one occasion!) and she reoriented my focus to remembering the balance of the overall picture.
- Changing the eye – We had a glossy white board underneath our abstract shapes and the white was reflecting on our objects. I was again focusing on every fine detail and Michiyo told me to neglect the reflection. She had us squint to help ignore the white reflection and to think about light and shadow and shade the object in that way.
Now for the watercolor class –
Painting in watercolor takes tremendous foresight and patience. You can’t erase watercolor like you can pencil. And you can’t overlap watercolor to hide mistakes easily like you can with other opaque mediums. It was great to get a better grasp of the medium but I do not think it is for me. I have these cheat watercolors that are crayon and then you add water after coloring it on the paper. I love it!
I have to schedule in art time because otherwise I will do silly things with my precious free time like fiendish Sudoku puzzles. I usually feel very guilty about leaving Sydney for a long time but I thought about her only a few times. I was intensely engaged and focused on art-making and I really needed that.
I’m glad I met Michiyo. She gives you space but also the appropriate guidance. She is not condescending and is really easy to talk to. Both classes had a lot of laughter. I would not do another watercolor class but I will continue to practice my line drawings and go back to her drawing class again later in the year to see how far I have come.
So for now, here’s the baseline – my productions from the day!
Products of classes from Michiyo Art Studio
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