Students from a specialist art and design college joined north east artists in a four-day drawing event as part of the world’s biggest drawing festival, with some of the region’s most talented professional artists getting involved.
Cleveland College of Art & Design (CCAD) in Middlesbrough took a completely white room and invited local artists, students and staff to ‘find a space and draw a face’ as part of The Big Draw, a month-long international celebration of drawing.
Artist Luke Dixon from The Bear Hug joined Ste Angus from Silver Tongue and Matthew Burton – all former students at the specialist art college – in the drawing extravaganza, which this year is themed ‘Every Drawing Tells A Story’.
Ste Angus was the first artist to visit The Drawing Room, where he spent two days creating a detailed nautical scene featuring various sea creatures. The freelance illustrator, who specialises in hand-rendered and digital image making for album covers, said: “I was really happy to come in and give my contribution. The staff and students were all sound and it was a lot of fun.”
The CCAD Drawing Room began with a set of blank walls and floor and over four days, was filled with self-portraits from hundreds of people. In addition to the personal artistic display, students also had the chance to try out a series of custom-made drawing machines created by the college’s 3D team, using bicycles and old record players to create a room full of unique, individual designs and add to the drawing mania.
Luke Dixon, owner of The Bear Hug, a successful online business featuring his distinctive artwork, spent the morning at his old college creating his most well-known design – a bear. He said: “Animals shapes are my business, so this could be described as a self-portrait! I think this is a great project, getting people drawing. I was really interested when I was invited by one of the lecturers, as I have not been back much since I graduated. I loved my time at CCAD as I loved art. I was that guy at school who could draw, so I did a foundation course which set me on my career path.”