A reply to Sally Bulgin’s editorial in the February Artist (as requested)

I start with a point of agreement. I too was surprised that the young artists in the School of Saatchi programmes had been given a life drawing exercise to do. This is because I wonder what the point of it was except as a rather pointless cruel joke. In today’s art world, with all the new technologies at their disposal and with so many ways of expressing themselves, it seems that to give them a rather archaic exercise means as little to them as if they were asked to throw a pot on a wheel or weave a basket. It has nothing to do with their practice as a contemporary artist in the artistic fields in which they have chosen to specialise. Now don’t get the impression that I am against life drawing. Far from it, I draw from the model every week and teach life drawing and thoroughly enjoy it, but I don’t think that, because I enjoy it and get a benefit from it, that everyone else should as well. Those of us who stick to the old fashioned practice of “ daubing coloured mud onto cloth with a stick and animal hair” as someone once called painting, have to accept that we are no longer relevent in the art world and that new technologies and thinking allow people to express profound truths about ourselves and society without having to draw nude people. Now I would agree that drawing is generally a vital part of looking and making sense of the world and it is characteristic that La Emin (who is gradually emerging as the Grand Dame of the art world) can still surprise us with her views (and long may she continue to do so) but I fail to see why it is so important if your artistic goals don’t require it. To expect these young artists to produce a good life drawing was unrealistic, as they haven’t been taught how to draw, simply because they haven’t been required to do so, as it is not relevant to their artistic goals. Now if your art does consist of depicting the three dimensional world on a two dimensional surface, which I would guess is the main concern of most of the readership of this magazine, then perhaps there is a case for life drawing, and it concerns me more that some people who paint and draw in the traditional ways exhibit such lamentable drawing skills, as a look through some of the portfolios on this very site will demonstrate. (I mention no names!). These are the people who could do with the discipline of life drawing, not the young artists for whom paint and canvas are no longer considered vital to their art. I am all for the continuance of life drawing and welcome Jason Bowyer’s initiatives in this field but let us be clear that for a lot of artists these days it is a fringe activity which contributes very little to their art.