The Maker's Space-Vail Church -January Charcoal Drawing

 

What a wonderful evening spent in God's presence meditating on pushing back the darkness with God's light inside of us.  The lesson itself can be found below as well as all of the pictures of art.  The medium of charcoal absorbed us completely, to chase away outside distractions and focus on God Himself!

Welcome to The Maker’s Space!  This is a spacious place where we use art to slow down and practice being in God’s presence.  The first step is believing that He is here, wanting to be with us, and wanting to create something with us. This is not an art project, but we are using art to slow down and be with God.  When we focus on Him, He tells us things.  We are learning to live with God, right where we are.

  We are going to use charcoal today and study light and dark.  God is light and in Him is no darkness at all.  Yet in our dark world, if we look, we can notice God’s light all around us and the darkness makes the light stand out even more. All you really need is paper and a piece of charcoal, but I will show you the type of paper I am using and the style of charcoal.  I am using a vellum paper that is not completely smooth, but has some texture or tooth as they call it to grip the charcoal.  If it is smooth, the charcoal will slide off.  Second, I have two types of charcoal, a vine for light coverage and a chunk for more coverage for big spaces.  There are all kinds of soft and hard charcoal pencils and erasing tools as you get into more detail, but for our beginning work here, we will use a tissue and maybe a kneaded eraser if you have it. If you have one, start pulling it and working it to make it soft and clean while we pray.

Just the fact that you are here means that you want to make time to be with God.  He says that if we seek Him, He will be found by us.  Once you have experienced being in His Presence, feeling His peace, you begin to crave it more and more.

Let us pause to be still,  close your eyes to the things around us and believe that God is here with us and wants to be with us.  Let’s start by taking a deep, slow breath, slowing down our heart,  letting go of the chaos around us and breathing in God’s brilliant light.  Breathe out darkness and worry and breathe in strength and peace.  As you keep breathing in God’s light and get stronger and stronger, use your imagination to hear these words and relax into His presence all around you. 

Think this verse as you breathe:

Breathe in: God is light

Breathe out:   in Him is no darkness at all

In order to hear my voice, you must release all your worries into My care.  Entrust to Me everything that concerns you.  This clears the way for you to seek My Face unhindered.  Let Me free you from fear that is hiding deep inside you.  Sit quietly in My Presence, allowing My Light to soak into you and drive out any darkness lodged within you. JC 10/7

For once you were full of darkness, but now you have light from the Lord.  So live as people of light!  Ephesians 5:8

The life of the godly is full of light and joy, but the light of the wicked will be snuffed out.  Prov. 13:9

If you are filled with light, with no dark corners, then your whole life will be radiant, as though a floodlight were filling you with light.  Luke 11:36

Put your trust in the light while there is still time; then you will become children of the light.  John 12:36

God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all.  John 1:5

For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ.—2 CORINTHIANS 4:6

Our first drawing will be on newsprint, so you can get a feel of the charcoal. Take the thin piece of vine charcoal and start to draw the subtle shadows. Leave white spaces for the white, you may be working on the negative space. Less is more and suggestions are powerful.  Only draw what you see, not what you think you see. Be comfortable not drawing a line if you don’t see it. Use your tissue wrapped finger first for an eraser. Smudging is good for subtlety. Use your fingers too and the side of the charcoal. Play with the charcoal and get use to using it.

Let’s look at our art and tell the difficulties or good parts that you like.

1.Next, let’s take a clean sheet of paper and tape it to your cardboard.

2.Start to cover all the paper with dark charcoal, taking care to cover but not to press down too hard so that it can be taken up again, but dark enough. Leave the general shape of the white of the vase, where you can add shadows later.

3.Next, start to lift the charcoal with a tissue wrapped around your finger, the shapes of the flowers. Get the shape of the vase and the placement of the flowers.  You can add details later.  Don’t get bogged down in the details. Look for leaves as well. 

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4. When you have done all of the flowers, go back and add back the darkest places for shadows.  Then go back and add in any details in dark, always being aware of the light that needs to be uncovered. Light layers are better, so you can pull it off and add.

5.Start to take off some more of the white white.  First with a tissue, making sure that you notice the shadows of soft grey. Not all of the grey is the same.  Some is darker than other.

[picture]

6.Add any dark details like flower centers.

7.Now, go back with your kneaded eraser and take out the white whites.  There aren’t really that many.  You will have to continue to work your eraser to get a clean spot.

Periodically, blow off the charcoal into the wastebasket.

Stand back and make any adjustments on the vase for proportions.

Remember, this is an impressionistic drawing.  If your flowers aren’t exactly in the right place, that is ok.  If your flowers don’t look exactly like the picture, that’s ok.  Your background won’t be as dark as the photo, but that’s ok.  As long as you have dark next to light, it will make the light appear more light.  So, on your bright whites, make sure you have a dark dark.

Let’s look at our work.  What have you learned about light and dark?  Light really shows up next to the darkest places. If we truly believe that we have the light of Christ living in us, the dark will supernaturally be able to see it even if we cannot because the light cannot be overcome by the darkness. The darkness is all around, but the light puts boundaries on the dark so that it can only go so far. 

 

If God is light and His light is in us, what do we have to fear?