Life drawing - life lessons

Vasile Dohotaru

Vasile Dohotaru - pastel of Villa Fontaine

After life drawing

Cafè terrace at night - apres Van Gogh
Cafè terrace at night - Van Gogh

Life drawing

After the complete tragedy of losing everything in the villa, I naturally was / am in a bit of a state of shock ... I still don't know the complete damage that these thieves have done to me ... but then ... an amazing thing happened ... I saw an artist doing a pastel painting of the Villa Fontaine.

Meet: Vasile Dohotaru

Vasile is this fascinating bohemian artist who hails from a section of old Russia. He's a brilliant artist and just happened to be at the side of the lane with his chalk and his paper and his stool. So ... I walked over to him and in his Russian turned French and my English - French combo, we managed to communicate quite well ... and become friends.

The artists in Antibes have heard of my misfortune and organized a bit of a rally for me. Last night I was invited to a life drawing session in an ancient part of the ramparts. I arrived at 9:00 pm and Vasile was kind to give me some of his paper. The model, of course, is lovely and accomlished very difficult and beautiful poses. It was freeing and exciting for me too draw with these artists - by the way, aside from the model, I was the only girl.

Imagine this: you're in a building erected by the Greeks or Romans - medieval - and there is a lovely model before you ... the room is quiet but you can hear the scratches of pencils and chalk ... the model takes another pose and you hear comments of admiration ... in french, of course ... and russian ... it brought joy back into my heart ... and afterwards, Vasile, Viktor and I shared a beer in the nearby cafe. It was great for me ... to be in this glorious place ... like Vincent Van Gogh's 'cafè terrace at night'.

OLYMPUS AMERICA