Academy of Fine Art Zagreb

New blog site, new blog!   Wordpress no longer working and I have spent hours creating illustrated blogs which have disappeared! A frustrating waste of time.  Exit Wordpress!

By now, I've settled in very well to the Academy of Fine Art.  The building is located on Ilica Ulica [street] and is surrounded by lush greenery, with many fine sculptural pieces scattered around the campus. It will be 110 years old next year and the department is planning to host an exhibition of the work of staff and students to celebrate this anniversary and all Erasmus students taking the Illustration module, [incl myself] have been asked to create work with the theme of self portrait. I'm working on this at the moment.

I am sharing a beautiful studio space on the third floor [no lifts!] with three other students, including Katrin, of Belfast Erasmus fame!  I am based in the outer room leading into this lovely atelier style space, with views onto a garden bordered by a row of housing.
Painting
 I'm working on a large canvas which is on the theme of sibling inter-relationships - a continuation of my work started in Belfast last semester.  There are very few artistic supply outlets here in Zagreb and it took some time to get turpentine that wasn't quite so toxic as the one I bought in a small local outlet.  It was a horrific substance and really shouldn't be used at all by artists, I think.  I'm looking forward to getting my Sans odour and odour free white spirit delivered from home this week.

This is the view of the bigger studio where Katrin, Mona and Mada are based.  We work well together but I'm happy with my smaller area, no radiators and a wide open window!  I'm allergic to central heating, I think!!
The modules I'm signed up for include figure drawing, illustration, drawing processes and painting.
Figure drawing is held four times a week.  Our tutor is Szlatan Vehabovic, who was on a residency programme for the first three weeks of October.  He started classes this week past. So far, we've just had one male model posing for us but I was told that there will be a female model made available at some later stage.  There are different modes of poses on each day, quick poses on Mondays, standing on Tuesday, sitting on Wednesday and lying down Thursday.  As drawing processes takes place in another campus on Wednesdays, it is sometimes difficult to go to figure drawing on that day.  I am experimenting with different media in this subject, charcoal, oil pastel crayons, acrylics and indian ink and am really enjoying the experience.
Drawing processes
This takes place in a separate campus, in Jabucovak, located in the hills above Ilica.  I'll write a separate blog on this.
Illustration
Our tutor here is Pero Mrnarevic and we are discussing the use of metaphor in art and literature with special reference to De Chirico's work,  Melancholy and the mystery of the street.  I've researched the background of this work.  We are asked to illustrate our interpretation of it and I've created a number of sketches.  
So much to do.