Crealdé Fall Session

Posted on by Thor

The Crealdé School of Art Fall sessions will be session from August 17, 2020 to October 8, 2020. The Crealdé main campus and the Hannibal Square Heritage Center reopened on Saturday, May 16, 2020.

I will be teaching an Urban Sketching Course  in the Fall but likely students will remain on campus for doing location drawings. The sketch above is an example of a quick demo I did for students on campus.

The school is initiating new safety features and health practices which will be in place until further notice.

The Crealdé School Covid-19 Safety Measures.

1. Reducing the maximum number of students in classes to 6 – 8 students depending on classroom size and medium.

2. Re configuring the studio spaces and work tables to allow for 6 feet of social distance. Classroom floors will be clearly marked in a way that student traffic and pathways utilized will not impede or intrude upon the six-foot or more social distancing.

3. Galleries and exhibition spaces will be limited to 10 visitors at a time adhering to the 6 foot social distancing guidelines.

4. On a daily basis, Crealdé and Heritage Center staff are cleaning bathrooms and disinfecting doors, handles and classroom surfaces.

5. The school staff will promote frequent and thorough hand washing by faculty, staff, students and visitors.

6. Any staff, faculty, students or visitors who are coughing, sneezing or in general not feeling well, are asked to please stay at home, and to continue to follow the directions of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) or a health professional. Anyone demonstrating health issues will be asked to leave.

7. Students are encouraged to use their personal work and art tools and equipment when possible. For youth classes, separate individual “baggies” will be provided for each student’s class supplies.

8. The school is instituting regular/enhanced instructor housekeeping and maintenance/janitorial practices, including routine cleaning and disinfecting of surfaces, equipment, and other elements of the school environment after each class is dismissed.

9. Until further notice, the school strongly encourages the wearing of masks in classrooms and exhibition spaces for students and visitors.  All  instructors will be wearing masks in class.

Weekend Top 6 Picks for August 25 and 26, 2018

Posted on by Thor

Saturday August 25, 2018

10 a.m. to Noon. Free. FusionFest Open House, Preview and Sign-up. City Beautiful, 1220 Alden Road, Orlando, FL 32803. Do you like to share the culture of your heritage, or perhaps you know
someone who does? Or perhaps you would like to be inspired to create a
song or dance or prepare a new dish using elements from different
influences? Or maybe you would like to volunteer for an exciting new
festival designed to bring people together?

We are hosting a
FusionFest Open House, Preview and Sign-up event on Saturday, August
25, from 10 a.m.-noon. Please stop by to learn more about FusionFest,
and then pass this invitation on to anyone else who might be curious
about this celebration of diversity planned for November 24 and 25 in
downtown Orlando.

7 p.m. to 9 p.m. Free. New Musical Discovery Series – The United States of Us. The MEZZ 100 S Eola Dr Ste 200, Orlando, Florida 32801. Florida Theatrical Association presents a workshop of THE UNITED STATE
OF US, one of the winners selected from more than 40 entries in the
Second Annual New Musical Discovery Series.

Book & Lyrics by Alan Gordon

Music by Joy Son

Staged Reading Directed by Michael Wanzie

Synopsis:
Set in Brooklyn in 1998, Ken, a single gay man, agrees to marry Esme, a
Colombian student, when she finds herself pregnant and on the verge of
deportation. When the prospect of same-sex marriage comes to New York, a
surprising threat is presented to this unusual family unit.

10:30 p.m. to Midnight. Free but get food and drink. Son Flamenco. Ceviche Tapas Orlando, 125 W Church St, Orlando, FL. Hot blooded flamenco dancing set to acoustic guitar.

Sunday August 26, 2018

9:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. $255 members, $275 non-members. Urban Sketching Course. First of 6 weekly sessions. Crealde 600 St. Andrews Blvd Winter Park FL Class 1B. Beginning of each class involves classroom sketch assignments followed by a session of sketching outside the classroom in the neighborhood. Goal at the end of 6 weeks is to produce finished sketched within two hours.

10 a.m.to Noon. Free. Heartfulness Relaxation and Meditation Class. University, 5200 Vineland Rd, Orlando, FL 32811. The Method of Heartfulness A simple and practical way to experience the heart’s unlimited resources.

7:30 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. $10-$20 suggested donation. Helena. Helena is an ensemble of Central Florida’s most dauntless singers. The
group made their debut at Timucua in 2016 and quickly established
themselves by performing adventurous and ambitious repertoire by and
about women. Don’t miss this Orlando treasure. Please bring food or wine to share.

Black Rock opens on Conroy Windermere Road.

Posted on by Thor

I teach an Urban Sketching Course at Elite Animation Academy (8933 Conroy Windermere Rd, Orlando, FL 32835). The main premise l to encourage students to keep a sketch pad with them at all times, so they can document the everyday moments of the lives. How often have you gone to a restaurant and found the wait time intolerable? If you sketched then it would see like the service is always too good since you don’t quite have enough time to finish the sketch you started. To a sketch artist sitting still, I work seems to us by. The challenge is to catch enough of those moments to bring the sketch alive. In this sketch, those two servers in aprons never actually stood and spoke to each other. Each was speaking to some one else who walked away before they could be captured. As the artist, I get to decide who interacts to each other in my world.

Service was actually very good at Black Rock (8965 Conroy Windermere Rd, Orlando, FL 32819). The restaurant gets it’s name from the sizzling steak it serves on literal hot rocks. I think the rock keep the steaks hot longer. I didn’t order a steak. I was here with my three Urban Sketches to sample an appetizer and to sketch. This was the final class so we pulled out all the stops using co to as well as line. Watercolor doesn’t hold up very well on | thin animation paper use in class, so I encouraged the student to try colored pencils to add color. I played along with them doing this sketch to show how I might approach the scene. The scene incorporate foreground, middle ground and background.

We had guacamole which was also served in a black rock dish. I can say that the appetizer was quite good, and I hope to return someday to try a full meal. The food certainly smelled delicious as servers walked past with the sizzling meals.

My Urban Sketching Class goes to the Hair Salon.

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I teach an Urban Sketching Course at Elite Animation Academy (8933 Conroy Windermere Rd, Orlando, FL). This semester, I have just 3 students which is an advantage, since it allows me to get the students into venues which might not work with a large class. The first half of the class was spent in the Elite Academy classroom, where I had the students do four drawings from different angles of one of the Disney Feature Animation desks. After those drawings were done, I posed four times and they had five minutes to work my pose into each sketch. This mimics my work routine, since I often arrive at a venue early to sketch the setting and then I sketch people as they arrive to the event.

For the second half of the class we went downstairs to Cavallo Hair Designers (894) Conroy Windermere Road Orlando FL.) I asked employees and costumers if it was alright to sketch, and every one was on board. My students sat in the waiting area chairs far from the action and I had to coax and encourage them to get closer. Helen, who must be in her 90s, was getting her hair curled. Her hair designer, James, was chatting away the whole time as he made her beautiful. It is a shame we arrived late in the process, because he said we should have done before and after sketches. His sister runs an arts organization in Brooklyn called Fiercely Curious.

When Helen’s hair was done, the designer used a hand held mirror to show her the results. “Oh, is that me?” she said. Her daughter and brother in law came into the shop with a wheel chair. It took quite a while to get her from one seat to the next. She was a very satisfied customer. I sensed that my students were a little frustrated that everyone kept moving. I tried to let them know that they should focus on some aspect of the scene that is stable once that frustration sets in. Sketch results varied, but it was a good lesson that we need to feel beautiful at any age. A second customer was having foil put in her hair. That would have been another great sketch opportunity, but we were out of time and needed to get back to the classroom.

Urban Sketching at Elite Animation.

Posted on by Thor

For the Urban Sketching Course I teach at Elite Animation Academy, I take the kids down to a local pond. We sketch the ducks who have just had chicks. If you stay very still, the mom a duck brings her chicks right up to you, assuming I suppose that we will feed them. It is a great opportunity to get quick sketches of them.  They never stay still of course, so getting a sketch is a challenge.

the students are also instructed to sketch the architecture of the shopping mall that i n eat to the lake. Finding the vanishing point is a challenge to many beginning Sketchers, but I point out the visual cues to each student one on one. Some kids just put the sketchbook aside and enjoy the sun. [ can lead them to water but I can’t make teem drink. A little day dreaming is also part of the artistic process. When we get back to the classroom, we tape our favorite sketch on the board and have a mini art show.

Urban Sketching workshops at Elite Animation,

Posted on by Thor

I am now teaching Urban Sketching Course at Elite Animation Academy  (8933 Conroy Windermere Rd, Orlando, FL) to middle school and high school students.This is a wonderful opportunity for me to share my love of simple direct observation and the pleasure that can be found from always carrying a sketch pad. The small class size, allows me to always offer notes for every student’s sketch. The first hour of each class, we work in the classroom on warm up exercises and the day’s lesson. Then we break out of the classroom and sketch on location somewhere in the neighborhood. On this occasion, we sketched in a Subway’s Sandwich shop. The lesson on this sketch outing was one point perspective and the students looked down the length of the shop.  It is always rewarding to watch students get lost in the process. The re is always some socializing as well, and I has he to find the right balance between work and play. If only a few students develop the habit of documenting their lives in sketches, then I have certain done my job.

Spring Urban Sketching Course at Elite Animation Academy.

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This spring, I will be teaching an Urban Sketching Course at Elite Animation Academy (8933 Conroy Windermere Rd, Orlando, FL 32835). The 11 week Course is on Thursdays, from March 31 until June 9. Students should be 10 years and up. Adults are welcome. The time of the course is from 4:30 to 6:30 PM. The cost is $250 per month plus one time $50 enrollment fee and $25 per session supply fee.

Enroll online.:  Terms of enrollment: This is an 11 week course. Your credit card will be charged a monthly fee of $250 Per month, per course. All credit cards are securely kept on file for future credit card billings. Student attendance is mandatory, only sign up if you are willing to give us the time to make you a better artist. No refunds or credit will be given once booking is confirmed.

The students will learn the basic principles used in creating an urban sketch. Principles include, shape, form, line, value, color, space, composition, emphasis, rhythm, and exaggeration, balance, proportion, harmony, variety, and texture. All classes will consist of a brief lecture in class followed by sketches done outside the classroom. We will stay close together as a class while students are encouraged to sketch what interests them the most. If it is hot, we will seek out an air conditioned venue, if it is nice out, we will sketch outside. Students are also encouraged to write about their experiences and to always carry a sketchbook a a visual journal. Discover Orlando, one sketch at a time.

My Urban Sketching class gets students sketching everyday events.

Posted on by Thor

I have been teaching an Urban Sketching course at Elite Animation Academy, 8933 Conroy Windermere Rd, Orlando, FL.  My goal is to get kids out of the classroom and sketching in the community. I start by teaching a few drawing fundamentals to see where my students stand. When l feel they are ready, we head out to find subjects in the neighborhood. In this case, we went to Jeremiah’s Ice, 4750 The Grove Drive Windermere FL. The challenge with this scene was that the line is constantly moving. The advantage was that there was always a line. In class we had worked on a series of quick five minute poses which hopefully helped get them ready for sketching from life on location.

The student I put in the foreground of my sketch seemed very tentative in class, but once he started sketching on location he worked with a bold confident line. I missed the mark a bit in my sketch because the person at the front of the line looks like he is facing the wall rather than facing the woman taking his order. I am happy to have caught the mom’s gesture as she guided her son up to the window.

Yesterday, Terry and I went to see Inside Out at the West Orange Theater, 1575 Maguire Rd #109, Ocoee, FL. There are always campy local ads running right until show time. An ad for Elite Animation appeared on the big screen. I was pleasantly surprised to see myself in a quick 2 second shot within the promo. I’ve seen my drawings appear many times on the big screen but this was the only time I had ever appeared on a big screen. Terry was getting popcorn so she didn’t see my on screen debut. I can’t let it go to my head. Just in case, I’ll start writing an Oscar acceptance speech. Oh, and be sure to see Inside Out in theaters now. Pixar has hit another home run. I gave it 10 out of 10 Joys.

Sketching an Olympia Baseball practice.

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Elite Animation (8933 Conroy Windermere Rd, Orlando, FL), now has an Urban Sketching Course that I teach. I am always searching for interesting events and businesses to sketch in this little corner of Orlando. If I hear a crowd, I walk toward it. That happened on this sunny afternoon as I heard whoops and hollers coming from the baseball field. I walked my five or so intrepid Urban Sketchers over to watch the baseball practice from the grand stands.

This wasn’t a game, but a practice for the Olympia Baseball team. Although we were sketching from behind a chain link fence, I encouraged all the students to leave the fence out. In the outfield, players were doing sprints. There were a few batters, but mostly the pitcher and catcher worked solo.There were tarps over home plate, but they were later rolled up and removed. This wasn’t quite an event in my mind, but it was a great sketch opportunity for my students.