This course is an invitation to free the hand in order to free ideas, creating and experimenting in a playful way, starting from imperfection and error.
We will work with freshness and freedom, using play as an antidote to the fear of the blank page. Through trials, attempts, and mistakes, imagination will naturally take shape. We will experiment with materials and pigments, observing their reactions on paper and the possibilities that emerge from the dialogue between different techniques.
We will “get our hands dirty,” beginning with small characters and details, gradually and calmly moving toward more complex compositions. We will play with lines, shapes, and volumes; we will explore light and shadow and perspective, only to set them aside when they are not needed for the story we want to tell.
Each participant will be guided in the search for their own expressive synthesis, working toward the essential through different techniques, from collage to silhouette.
We will practice storytelling exercises applied to drawing, designing small stories and their variations through numerous storyboards.
In the final phase, we will ask ourselves what form to give the project: we will explore formats, framing, and composition, discovering how the arrangement of elements on the page also carries narrative and symbolic value. Through examples of picture books, we will investigate the relationship between word and image. Those who wish may play with words, or choose to leave readers the freedom to invent them.
The course also offers the possibility of developing a personal project, to be agreed upon in advance with the instructor. In this case, the proposed exercises and techniques will be oriented toward building the characters and environments of one’s own story.
Illustration by Eva Montanari, Non resterò qui seduto ad aspettare, Paris, Musée des Arts décoratifs, donation The Mark on the Wall, 2017