artlab: geometric paintings

I’m a month behind in posting, but the February ArtLab for All Ages workshop at CMCA was such an interesting experience, that I’ve been meaning to write about it before it slips too far away.

The workshop focused on geometric lines and shapes as a prompt, which is something I’ve written about quite a bit (here and here and here are a few examples). For this workshop, I took 40 small canvas boards and with a black Sharpie, a ruler, and some circle templates (like the inside of a roll of masking tape), I drew a few lines and shapes on each. As you can see from the photos, I tried to vary designs so each canvas would be unique.

But what you can’t see from the photos is how choosy people were, so carefully selective about choosing a board that really spoke to them.

From that point on, it was a classic Art Lab for All Ages workshop where people worked alone

or collaboratively

but with great focus

very often discovering

 in working at their own pace

a sense of style or an approach to composing with color that made perfect sense to them.

Some people even discovered that a palette, in the process of working, becomes its own painting.

Now you might be wondering (as I was), What about those prompts? What might be said about this workshop with regard to the geometric prompts? 

I suppose I could do what’s usually the best thing: I could let the paintings speak for themselves. But because the experience of watching people respond to those black lines was really compelling, it’s impossible not to wonder about what might have been happening. So forgive me for quoting myself here, but an earlier post, What is a prompt?, seems to shine some light on the intriguing collection of work that was created:

A prompt is an armature on which to hang one’s designs.

A prompt is a mirror to reflect one’s imagination.

A prompt is a springboard from which to fly away.

A prompt, like a sketch, can be an underpainting. 

A prompt is just the first sentence in an unpredictable dialogue.