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On the last golden day of Fall, I had dinner on April's porch with my sister and her husband, Clay.
Did you know that all three of us started out in various forms of art degrees at KU? April was an industrial arts major, Clay was an architect major, and I was a graphic design major.
Please stop laughing April. Please stop! You know I wanted to be a fashion designer! Which is why it makes perfect sense that I chose to go to KU... a college that has absolutely no fashion design degree of any kind!
I remember very well, trying to explain this to my father as my parents were driving me to KU to drop me off for the start of my Freshman year.
"Uh... well dad... I uh... that is I um... well... I hope to become a famous fashion designer and you know... so I will like take some graphic design classes and uh... you know.. since I already know how to sew... I think it will all like... just sort of uh... you know... work out... and I will um... like.... probably be a famous millionaire fashion designer before Christmas."
And dad looked at me JUST LIKE THAT APRIL!!!
Except he did not have a glass of wine.
But I bet he needed a glass of wine really badly right then...
Strangely, this is not a post about me, or about wine, or about fashion design...
It is a post about nude models.
You see, all three of us were required to take a "life drawing class" for our various degrees. Even though none of us ever got those degrees... except Clay... he did become an architect...
But, all three of us did complete the "life drawing class" which met for THREE HOURS, twice a week.
"Life Drawing" was in fact how April and Clay met. But I will let April tell you that story. Today we will only speak of the nudes.
Clay will go first.
In Clay's first "life drawing class" he focused his entire drawing on the man's wrist and of course the watch... which the model still had on. He drew the hand and the wrist and the arm and the watch in great detail.
Then the teacher stepped up behind Clay and examined his work....
And he told Clay that he needed to draw the entire body.
Clay was foiled again.
April recounted the delightful time that there was a ball of fuzz trapped in the model's uh... the model's uh... the uh... model's body...
This made it very difficult for her to focus on anything except the ball of fuzz.
And me... well I was not in the same class with April and Clay. I was alone. I was a freshman from a small town and had no idea that someone was going to walk into my classroom and take off all their clothes.
April recounted the delightful time that there was a ball of fuzz trapped in the model's uh... the model's uh... the uh... model's body...
This made it very difficult for her to focus on anything except the ball of fuzz.
And me... well I was not in the same class with April and Clay. I was alone. I was a freshman from a small town and had no idea that someone was going to walk into my classroom and take off all their clothes.
Our class had met several times before the nude model showed up and we had drawn fruit, and piles of metal objects, and we had partnered up and drawn each other, but we had not taken off our clothes. So when the model... a male model... walked in... in a pair of jeans and a t-shirt and proceeded to step into the middle of the class, peel off his pants... his shirt... and his underwear!!!!... and then stand there in front of us looking kind of bored... while we were instructed to draw his body... I am sure my eyes grew as big as cantaloupes!
I wanted to run out of the class room. I wanted to hide inside of my drawing tablet. I wanted to melt into the floor and never be heard from or seen again. I was so embarrassed!
I wanted to run out of the class room. I wanted to hide inside of my drawing tablet. I wanted to melt into the floor and never be heard from or seen again. I was so embarrassed!
I also had an unbelievably strong urge to burst out laughing.
I wanted to laugh so much!
It was gurgling up from my guts and forcing it's way into my esophagus, and swinging back and forth on my tonsils, and clamoring around my cheeks and slipping off my tongue and pushing against my lips!
I may have gasped a few times. I may have coughed or made some unusual snorting sounds. But I did not laugh. I held that laugh for THREE SOLID HOURS. I literally thought I was going to die from NOT LAUGHING, but I did not laugh.
By the time the class was over, I was exhausted from holding myself in check for the entire class. I climbed up the hill to my dorm full of a great story for my roommates. The girls all gathered around as I recounted every moment of my struggle. And then we laughed. We laughed until tears formed a lake beneath our feet and we almost drowned. And I was greatly relieved.
I quickly grew accustomed to nude models... and shortly thereafter, they became nondescript... and then I hardly realized a nude person was standing in front of me... and then I started nodding off in class whenever there was a nude model.
I may have gasped a few times. I may have coughed or made some unusual snorting sounds. But I did not laugh. I held that laugh for THREE SOLID HOURS. I literally thought I was going to die from NOT LAUGHING, but I did not laugh.
By the time the class was over, I was exhausted from holding myself in check for the entire class. I climbed up the hill to my dorm full of a great story for my roommates. The girls all gathered around as I recounted every moment of my struggle. And then we laughed. We laughed until tears formed a lake beneath our feet and we almost drowned. And I was greatly relieved.
I quickly grew accustomed to nude models... and shortly thereafter, they became nondescript... and then I hardly realized a nude person was standing in front of me... and then I started nodding off in class whenever there was a nude model.
Just another nude model.
What's another nude model?
I believe this is called growth.
The end.
I believe this is called growth.
The end.
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30 comments:
I'm so glad college was such a fullfilling part of your life girl!
Oh good gracious, I don't know whether to laugh, shake my head, or cry! And CD did not partake in your dinner on the veranda because???
Thanks for the laugh!
Ah, now I see why you and doc get along so well. Just another nude body, sigh. ;)
I also have a degree in architecture and NEVER had to draw a naked body. Darn.
Apparently, I really missed out during my college years. Who doesn't like a nude model....although I supposed there are bad nude models!
I was a nurse many, many years ago. We didn't get to draw nude models. We got to wash them. Usually not the young good looking ones however. Sometimes the images still come back to haunt me.
I so want to know how April and Clay met. I will jump over and ask her later.
Do you make any of your clothes?
Was that a pun - you talk about male models and then end up saying: I guess you could call it growth?
Oh - it wasn't... Oh dear.
Hilarious post!
i have a BA in art. nothing fancy ever happened and certainly NO nude models.... sigh.... i must have gone to the wrong college...? joann TX
I remember those days at Art School also!! Now that I'm an old lady I just laugh when I think how "adult" I was trying to be when the naked lady was there!!! I had the missfortune of sitting next to the nastiest boy in class!! on his sketch pad he had only two dark circles and the hairy triangle nothing else!! just that and he kept going over and over those three areas....over...over...over....
No Melissa - My ability to sew was primarily a figment of my imagination as well. Everything I ever made turned out crooked - one sleeve tight, one sleeve loose, fitting my neckline at an angle, it was awful.
I'm sorry but I would have giggled like a twelve year old boy in the girls locker room. It would have been pathetic.
When I was in High School I was employed at the local hospital as a surgery aide. I had to shave people before surgery. Let's just say there were many men who felt um..inferior because of my giggling.
I KNEW I should've gone to college!! Heehee!
Dinner looked yummy!
I'd have been on the floor in tears. All them male jibbly bits are enough to make me giggle...God must have an awesome sense of humor.
I'm so glad I was not in that class with you. I would have glanced over at you and burst out laughing. I've never been very good at controlling my laughter, especially when I'm nervous. And that would have made me very nervous. And embarrassed.
I have no problem really with paintings of nudes. My brother is an artist. Well, I was a little uncomfortable during his last art show when I found out that the male nudes were self portraits. Ew. I began to focus on the faces and the backgrounds and soon I did not even know I was looking at nudes. But that's another story. My point is actual nude people is quite different from nude paintings.
So, I am very glad I wasn't in that class with you. Because I am not mature enough to handle such things.
I'm also so glad that you are able to fulfill a little of your dreams of being a fashion designer through your Grey Gardens photoshoots with April.
BTW, my little brother has a master's in fine art. He had to do a LOT of drawing of nude models. The models they got for the classes were rarely attractive and always a bit off. He tells some hilarious stories about insane nude models. When he paints or draws nudes now he gets to choose his own models. Most of the female nudes are his wife, which is understandable. I don't know if I'd want my husband having other nude models. Apparently he's a little uncomfortable with male nude models, hence the self portraits.
I could not have handled a nude model at that time in my life. I probably would have walked out of class. Thank God I never had to make that choice.
I am so jealous. I just realized that. I have three sisters and they all live 7 states away so we never get together to have dinner on each other's porch. With or without kids. I really miss that. I guess I'll have to move back to the cold north....Um Nope! I'll just live vicariously through you and hope my sisters come to visit.
Thankfully there was no reason to hold in my laughter just now. Thanks for that. Ahh!
Great photos! You all had a nice dinner...and I love the views from April's veranda.
I can't imagine standing nude in front of a class of artists for three hours straight. Wow. That takes guts.
Mmmm! Yes, I can relate! 3rd floor Strong. Right? Unless they've moved the art department. When I was an art major at KU in '64 we also had nude models. You didn't say if they had their "privates" covered. One of the male models that we had wore a little bag or sack over his and his mother had made it. It was pink with little lambs!! Honestly this is true. We also had a little old farm couple who would come to model. They we very short and rotund. He would be wearing bibbies and she would have a scarf tied under her chin when they arrived. NEVER in your wildest dreams would you EVER believe that they were nude models. When I took the class I had professor Eastwood as my teacher..he was a legend even back then. A small little man who loved to flirt with all the girls. Your postbrought back many memories.
I am now a nurse and I ascribe to the theory just another nude body. Yawn!!! Thanks for the laughs!!
Sandyt
HAHAHAH! I'm sending this to my daughter who is an art major and had/got to take a figure drawing class. Yes, it was the human figure! And yes, it eventually was boring! And in the post above by Sandi--How close did you examine this sack made by a boys mother covered with lambs! that's funny!
In response to Dawn...I kept my distance!! He kept trying to hit on me and he definitely was NOT my type..with or without clothes!
Sandyt
Hey Shabby - by the time April, Clay and I were drawing naked people, the fine arts classes were held in a new building behind Hoch auditorium. I forget the name, but it was a dismal place except for the bridge that connected it to the fine old architecture hall.
Ohmigosh! You are so funny! My sister Dawn sent me over here, and I'm so glad! BTW, I am a nurse, and nudity is no big any more, but I have to say, that be glad you're not a man. They love being nude, they love their "parts" and they're pretty sure you must love their "parts" too. Yuck.
That first picture of you is a little rouch Rechelle! Maybe the reaction of April calling you the 'ancient one' ;)
Jordan is going for that same graphic design degree, at that same KU, and is taking that same life drawing class for 3 hours at a time, twice a week! It's not his favorite class!!
That was the new Hoch right? They tore down all the beautiful old buildings like Fraser and Robinson gym. I lived in Hashinger when I was there, it is probably called one of the "old" buildings now. It must be about 50 now so that puts in the semi-antique catagory. I was married at Danforth I hope they haven't done anything to it. It's been about 5 years since I've been back.
PS they used to call 3rd floor Strong the "Twighlight Zone" Wonder why????????????
Rechelle,
I know it's hard to remember things now that you're so old, but the building we did all the nekked drawing in was called...and this is a hard one...The Art and Design Building, I know, I know, it's a long name with big words. Also, it wasn't behind Hoch, it's behind Murphy Hall which is the Architecture building. Mkay? Glad I can help the elderly.
Shabby - I LIVED IN HASHINGER HALL TOO!!! It was the creative and performing arts hall during my stay.
I just laughed like a crazy person. I'm sure my room mates are wondering what the heck is going on across the apartment in my room. Lol. I am currently in a Figure Drawing class because I am a Fine Arts Major. The first day a model (female) came in and stripped I was like, "OH! Well! Um... okay" and then it was fine. For it was just a girl. And I am currently in my second semester of Figure Drawing class and I still have yet to see a naked male model. Now I, like you had, grew too familiar with the female figure in the sense it wasn't anything new to me anymore. In fact, I am so used to the naked body, I am actually ready for there to be a male model just for some change and excitement! Lol!
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