East Croydon United Reform Church, 12 October 2024

Rise and shine for life modelling with Croydon Life Drawing Group from 9:30am on this cold Saturday morning. Mercifully, group organiser Francis Wardale had already switched on room heaters, situated high upon the walls of our pose space. Even so, I took the precaution of also switching on a portable fan heater, nearby on the floor.

The first hour was for short poses that ranged in length from 5 minutes to 15 minutes. Next, after a tea break we would have a single long pose of about an hour and a half. After half an hour, artists wearing jumpers and cardigans started complaining: “it’s so stuffy in here…”

The complaint was repeated at the interval, and they were right, it was stuffy, but also it was 10°C outside. I would have happily said some heaters could be turned off, but I thought it was a shame no-one voiced any consideration for their nude model. Before the restart, wall heaters were sacrificed; I was fine to go on with just the fan heater.

Tellingly, during the long-pose I noticed one artist put her jumper back on. My comfort was sufficient, however, not only to need no temperature tweaks, but also not even to need a brief stretch until 70 minutes had elapsed. Ultimately, I left on a happy high as the extraordinary portrait below was given to me as a gift. Now that’s heart-warming.

Pose minutes, 9:30am-12:30pm

Part 1 : 5, 5, 10, 10, 10, 15.
— break —
Part 2 : 93 with a 1-minute break on 70 minutes.

Artworks

With apologies to artists I’m unable to credit.