Going back into the archive to look at life drawing from the 19th century through the 20th century gave us
a chance, really, to challenge some of the stereotypes and mythologies that have surrounded the practice.
If it's going to have relevance for future generations it has to be reimagined and reconceptualised
and we have to understand the traditions of the life room through a historical lens.
It's only through an understanding of those issues that the life room can be reimagined and remain relevant.
Life drawing has to be understood in the context of our education pre-1960
when life drawing was considered to be the central tenet upon which an art student’s education was based.
So, in a sense, students were taught to draw based on an understanding of representation or figuration that had evolved since the renaissance.
I always think about the words of one of the artists we talked to about his own training in life drawing
and he described just the intensity and the rigour of his education in the late 40s and 50s
and the incessant criticism you had day after day in the life room.
He said it was seen that you couldn’t do art unless you could draw, and draw really well.
During the 1950s, with the explosion of art practices
that tried to sever their ties with a historical past that looked decidedly dated,
students and art tutors left the life room behind and ventured into the experimental workshop.
The life room became increasingly perceived as representing tradition instead of progression.
I originally thought that it would be a bit uncomfortable to draw from someone who is naked, just standing in front of you
but when it was actually happening I think it wasn’t really uncomfortable because the model was so comfortable with herself.
There is a huge amount of potential to start deconstructing media imagery, body imagery,
all the different problems that teenagers have, going through puberty and the pressures that they have.
Especially now, it seems much more acute than when I was growing up.
That kind of experience of looking at another body and then trying to recreate it
and realising that there are things that come out about how you are perceiving and understanding that body
in relationship to your own, in relationship to the other images and other bodies that you see, is so interesting.
The fact that there is a huge amount of society that is missed out of media representation,
that’s some of the things which I think the students really struggle with.
I think what's causing the issue is the lack of any other imagery to counteract those very specific images
which are generally very slim, white, blonde hair, beautiful.
Or beautiful in the sense of what we deem to be beautiful.
Which I think, again, is another really interesting point. There isn't any of the others, the otherness is missing.
We perceive our bodies through our relationships with images and they come into being through our relationships with other images.
I think when all of those images look the same then that only gives us this very narrow framework
through which to create our identity and our sense of self.
It was really important for us to include the models’ voices in our research.
What we discovered was actually that they often shared very personable, personal and intimate relationships with the artists.
Marita Ross, one of the models who is of particular interest, she started her career in the 1890s on the stage
and then she modelled widely for art schools and artists before she had to retire from the profession.
She went on in the waning years of the profession to chronicle the fortunes and fates of the artist model.
"I'm losing my figure, the model said, dropping her clothes by her Chelsea bed.
My hips are thick and my chin is double.
Posing seems endless toil and trouble.
And here’s a bump, a roll of fat.
What would Sir Gerald have said to that?"
The model, she had a very interesting body. She had scars on her shoulder, she had tattoos,
and I think it was interesting to see because her body was telling a story of what she's been through in her life.
Being used to seeing bodies that are very polished and neat and perfect in the media,
it was interesting to be reminded that everybody is unique and everybody’s body is unique.
Every student, all of their first drawings were this very strong outline of quite a traditional set-up of a model
and the viewer looking at the model and trying to represent that.
Then, as the class moved on, those ideas got deconstructed through different ways of approaching the page and approaching the paper
and how to actually use and manipulate the materials that they were given.
The students got a lot of ownership over what they were doing through that and what they actually created then.
There was a lot of potential to pull out different narratives and stories from that.
Yeah, I think in one of the later images like the quite large one on the pink background with the yellow, quite abstract figure
it's really interesting to see how something really different is starting to emerge
that's not just about this classic representation of line.
It's much more expressive and there's kind of personality and feeling.
At the start I think I was very concerned in what I drew and how it drew it
but as I grew more comfortable I was more free with my work.
The artist told us to be a bit more free and not think about it too much
and use different interesting materials to show the different shadows on her body.
As we continued, I stopped looking at her and started thinking of what she's representing.
So I tried to look at what emotion or what feeling she's portraying with her position and her body
and I tried to represent that in my piece rather than just trying to look at how she's sitting and copy that.
I think the model herself helped me build my confidence in myself because she was confident with how she looked
but it wasn’t the type of confidence that you want to show off everything.
It was the type of confidence that, I'm okay with what I look like and I'm not ashamed of myself.
What a testament to the importance of art education, this experience that you’ve started with life drawing
but actually you’ve introduced all of these really important issues and questions and that your pupils,
regardless of whether they go on to be involved in the art world or be artists or not, they have been set up now
to go out into the world having an awareness and an understanding of being critical and thinking about those issues.
