Work From Life

Bonnie Graves Nude Sculpture at Creative Workshop in Rochester, New York
Bonnie Graves Nude Sculpture at Creative Workshop in Rochester, New York

We like entering the MAG through the Creative Workshop. We were there to see the the Finger Lakes show but we started with the student show in the Workshop. I’m quite sure Dejan Pejovic is a good teacher. His students’s work rises to the top. This small sculpture was done by Bonnie Graves and it was probably done from a live model. I know Dejan likes to work from life. It is worthy of one of my favorites, Gaston LaChaise.

Pat Pauli, Colleen Buzzard, Belinda Bryce, Nancy Jurs and Lee Hoag all have especially nice pieces in the show. Dejan’s sister, Lanna Pejovic, has a nice four panel treescape oil painting as well. I liked Andrew Zimbelman’s animation and Carol Woodlock’s “Woman Walking” video was beautiful.

1 Comment

One Reply to “Work From Life”

  1. I’m familiar with your blog. I started reading it a while back because I was interested in learning all about what it was like to be in Fred Lipp’s advanced painting class at the MAG. I was across the hall in Dejan Pejovic’s Tuesday night figure drawing class. I was hoping the next stop would be to take Fred Lipp’s class, but he passed away before I learned how to paint.

    I just wanted to say thank you so much for your kind words. It made me feel really good! It felt so good to be acknowledged. It also made me feel good to be a part of the Creative Workshop. Being able to display my artwork in the student show is one reason why I like taking classes there.

    I also enjoyed your reference to Gaston LeChaise! I know the MAG has at least two of his figure sculptures on display. I went ahead and did some more research about him and his muse. Very interesting! Thanks.

    I took Dejan’s figure drawing class for a year and now his sculpture class for a year. I already told Dan this story, but I really learned how to do figure sculptures in his figure drawing class, not in his sculpture class.

    While Dan was teaching figure drawing, he would often bring in his clay & wheel and do some quick gestures of the live model. I watched him do it several times so that when I finally signed up for his sculpture class I knew how to do a gesture of a model.

    The nude figure sculpture that you mentioned in your blog is of the model Michelle Long. She gave us a lovely pose in Dan’s sculpture class this spring. It’s one of the benefits of taking Dan’s classes because he does teach from life. It’s really fun!

    This summer I made two more sculptures in Dan’s class that will be in the next student show in October. One figure is from my imagination inspired by a recurring dream and the other is a portrait sculpture inspired by the artist Giacomo Manzu.

    Thank you again.

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