EXART - OCE - Fine Arts

This course serves as an introduction to western art, focusing largely on artists and objects that comprise the art history canon, from early 14th century art to modern art of the 20th century. In this introduction to the discipline of art history, you will be exposed to various artistic movements, and will be provided with a working knowledge of art history terminology.

Drawing is one of the cornerstones of art training and is fundamental for visual arts. Learn the essentials of drawing from observation. Employing pencil, conté, or charcoal on paper, class projects use still-life motifs to introduce you to the basic elements of drawing line, form, tone, and texture. Develop your awareness of seeing and understanding the factors that work in good picture-making and apply them to produce a finished drawing.

Build on your skills from Drawing I and further explore the fundamental elements of line, shape, texture, space, tonal value, and compositional principles and considerations such as figure-ground relationships, rhythm, and scale. Employing dry and wet media on paper, projects will focus on observational drawing from still-life and the human figure. While emphasis will be on representational drawing, achromatic linear, and tonal value studies, the use of colour, abstraction, and collage will be introduced. Completion of EXART 3005 is strongly recommended.

Explore the principles of drawing from the life model. A number of exercises, including quick and sustained studies, the study of basic human anatomy, and the relationship of the figure versus background, are employed to assist you in drawing the human form. Pencil, conté, and charcoal are recommended drawing media. Completion of EXART 3006 is strongly recommended.

Build on your drawing and design skills as you apply them to the principles and techniques of painting. Work in oil or acrylic to bring your own style to still life motifs in exercises that examine the planning, development, and composition of paintings. Completion of EXART 3003 and EXART 3005 is strongly recommended.

Apply your basic painting skills as you further explore techniques, colour theories, and descriptive and interpretative methods of oil or acrylic painting in the studio. Completion of EXART 3010 is strongly recommended.

This course is concerned with the compositional realization of the portrait. While painting from a model, you will become familiar with the art and historical approaches toward creating a successful portrait. Capturing likeness and expression will be emphasized. Become familiar with the bone and muscle structure of the human head as well as with the Western European technique of building flesh tones through layers. Completion of EXART 3010 is strongly recommended.

This course aims to expand spontaneity in your picture-making. Pursue drawing with mixed media such as charcoal, graphite, ink, watercolour and acrylics. Experiment with brush, pen and other drawing instruments. You will learn various strategies to work with mixed media and methods to effectively integrate them in your work. Expressive use of media to convey feelings will also be explored. Completion of EXART 3005 is strongly recommended.

Participants will learn the basics of watercolour painting such as colour mixing, flat wash, graded wash, and wet-in-wet technique. Properties of individual watercolour pigments will be addressed. In addition to working with still life motif, students will be introduced to landscape painting, floral study and abstract work.

Working on location en plein air is an excellent way to carry skills out of the studio and into the day-to-day practice of making art. Work on location at various sites and work in different media to stretch your limits and make drawing more accessible. Develop sketchbook skills where any location and any time become the mantra of your art making. Pen and ink is a portable flexible media which may be drawn, painted, splattered, and pushed to the limit to acquire results while on location. Depending on the skill sets of the students, oil pastels will be used as a bridge between drawing and painting. Completion of EXART 3006 is strongly recommended.