Gabriel

And now for something completely different...

Gabriel started at Blue Church Art in the fall of 2007, at the age of four. His siblings- Dominic, Victoria, and Thomas- had already been in the art classes for a few years. They were wonderful, talented kids, all very different from one another, each producing unique artworks. I expected that their little brother would be a great artist, too. 

Artwork by Gabriel's sister and brothers:
(click on any image to enlarge it)

Victoria

Dominic

Thomas

At first, Gabriel was a puzzle. Along with his classmates he would follow my instructions for drawing a subject, and create a very nice drawing. When it came time to apply color Gabriel would do the most unexpected things! He painted a leprechaun purple, and a zebra blue. Often he would cover his whole drawing with black paint, or a mixture of black and other colors. Like his brother Dominic, Gabriel is color blind. That might explain the purple leprechaun, and other unusual color choices, but not his fascination with the color black. He liked to experiment with his crayons and paints. He’d bunch a number of different crayons in his hand and color with them all at once. He’d fill in areas of his drawings with controlled scribbles of colored pencil lines. Using watercolor he’d load up his brush with paint and flick it above the paper, spattering color on his artwork...and all over the surrounding table. This was fascinating to the other kids in the class and they often imitated Gabriel’s techniques. Cleanup after Gabriel’s class took some extra time :)

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"early" Gabriel: a black cat

another of Gabriel's early works

blue zebra

vase of flowers

sun/moon

gumball machine

One day the students in Gabriel’s class drew gumball machines. I gave them circle templates and showed them how to use the templates to draw perfectly round gumballs inside the machine’s glass globe. One template also had arrows and geometric shapes on it. Gabriel saw it, and asked to use it. Love at first sight! Gabriel’s gumball machine was filled with triangles, circles, hexagons, and swirls of color. From then on he asked for the templates at the beginning of every class. Using colored pencils, he began constructing some fantastic artwork. I bought more templates with unusual shapes for Gabriel to experiment with. He asked for larger paper. Combining his free drawing with use of the templates he produced the most amazing compositions!

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Gabriel's template-inspired creations are all abstract. When someone asks, What is it? Gabriel answers I don’t know. The other students are curious about his work. If Gabriel joins a different class during a session, the kids from his previous class always ask about him: How’s Gabriel? Is he still...? (they don’t complete the question, because they don’t know what the word is that can describe Gabriel!) My answer is Yes, he’s still making those interesting drawings. Gabriel continues to be a puzzle, but I’ve grown accustomed to his unusual working style, and I delight in seeing what he’ll come up with next. Lately he’s been drawing on smaller paper again, creating simpler colored pencil compositions drenched in strong color. 

Next week another session of Blue Church Art classes begin. 
I wonder where Gabriel’s artistic journey will take him this time...

Update
More of Gabriel's artwork, created in the Winter and Spring 2013 sessions:

I showed Gabriel how to use graphite powder in his drawings. He likes to use it over colored pencil, removing some areas of the graphite with a kneaded eraser.