Our special guest for the last Drawing Together of 2020 was the brilliant artist and scholar Mita Mahato. You can learn more about her most recent work by visiting her Instagram. Our theme was ‘COLOR.’ In preparation for these exercises, Mita requested that your drawing area be prepared with a range of colors in the medium(s) of your choice: markers, colored pencils, pens, crayons, watercolor, paper, etc.
Warmup exercise:
- From the art supplies you have before you, choose two colors – one you really feel connected to, and one you do not.
- Draw a self portrait (realistic, as an animal, whatever you want) using the color you DO NOT connect with. See if you can use this opportunity to find in the color something that you can appreciate. Take 5 minutes to do this.
Discussion of color theory and applications within graphic medicine:
Main exercise, PART ONE:
- For the first part, create three large panels on your sheet of paper.
- Choose three colors you want to spend some time with. Also have a pen or sharp pencil handy.
- Color in each box with one of the solid colors you chose.
- Below each color field, write words that you associate with each of those colors that come to mind as you are drawing.
Main exercise, PART TWO:
- Take another sheet of paper and create six smaller fields.
- At the top, write, “This could be”
- Fill each of these fields with any six colors.
- Then caption each of the fields with any of the words or word phrases you wrote under the three colors in part one. Don’t worry about being too deliberate, just follow your instinct and see where it takes you. The idea is to reflect upon the strong associations that colors carry, as well as to challenge ourselves to think subversively about them.
Hope you enjoyed this exercise. Feel free to share your work on social media, using the hashtag #DrawingTogetherGM.