Real Life Drawing

Sometimes with all work I do digitally, I have to remind myself that I actually do know how to draw and paint. Its wasn't always that way though.

When I was a junior in high school, in order to take the AP Art class you had to submit a portfolio. I asked my teacher what I needed to do in order to prepare my portfolio and he told me that "if you can draw the human figure, you can draw anything." So I set off drawing the figure.

I found an open draw session that met at an art academy in nearby Lexington. Then I faced the embarrassing task of asking my aunt and uncle (my guardians at the time) and then my actual parents, for permission to go. How unfair that I had to tell four adults that I wanted to draw naked people!

My Uncle Lant (slightly uncomfortable about releasing his 15 year old niece into this situation) insisted on driving me to the class. I was surprised he didn't come upstairs with me and stay the entire time. Looking back, I kinda wished he had.

When I walked into the room, there were exactly four other people, all over the age of 40 and all veteran artists. I only remember a few details from that evening, besides being INCREDIBLY uncomfortable. I remember that the model had long red hair (down to his waist), which he had braided. And when he took his breaks he went outside in his boxers to smoke a cigarette (boxers? New England winter? weird.) He was also very flexible.

When I got home, I was hoping I could sneak up to my room and forget the whole thing. Not so. My Aunt Diane asked me to come into her room and to bring my drawings. She looked through them and the first thing she said was, "Well, I can tell he was circumcised."

This statement made me very nervous indeed. I understood what the concept of circumcision was, but when it came to what a circumcised penis looked like versus a non-circumcised penis, I was lost. In my head, I panicked.

If that was the first thing she noticed, then clearly I put too much detail into the penis. Oh man, she must think I'm a huge penis-obsessed pervert. They probably already think I'm a huge penis-obsessed pervert for wanting to go to the stupid open draw anyway!

My Aunt Diane (oh wise one) stepped in and explained the difference between the two penises. I wasn't a penis obsessed pervert after all. Phew.

It took me several years to recover from that night. BYU helped ease the transition back to real life drawing by providing models in swimsuits. I can safely say though, that I am no longer frightened of penises be they circumcised or not. In fact, there's an open draw that meets on Thursdays at a gallery here in Phoenix, if anyone would care to join me.