I’m five weeks into a year long course with the Royal Drawing School; the Online Drawing Development Year or ODDY.
Last year was filled with the intensity, joy and grief of looking after my father. The practicalities, emotions and changed relationship I had with Dad and other family members filled head and heart. Looking back that time seems akin to the burning passions of youth where everything seemed energised, heightened and pulled to emotional extremes, but I’m not sure it felt like that at the time. When Dad died life filled with grief and relief.
However within the exhaustion and distress, and the humour and love I think that my relationship to the world (the relationship as I perceive it to be that is), shifted in a positive and entirely unanticipated way. Right now I’m excited for the future, I have work I need to make, I have direction, I have capacity.
In committing to the ODDY I’m hoping to immerse myself in my drawing to see what comes out, I’m wanting to renew clear boundaries between studio time, family and paid work and to enjoy being part of an intense drawing community. Dad would be excited for me.
