Clubs

There’s no creative crisis that four pints of Stella and a woman wearing a rubber pig snout can’t resolve. I know this to be true because I am a recent graduate of Dr Sketchy’s Anti-Art School (Camden branch), the monthly life drawing class with a difference. There are quite a few differences, come to think of it. Allow me to explain.

Dr Sketchy’s London was founded last year by 21-year-old Ruka Johnson who dropped out of Chelsea College of Art after becoming frustrated with conventional approaches to life drawing. Already a successful burlesque performer herself, Ruka was well acquainted with the saucy joy of the naked form, but found it to be sadly lacking in the grim sterility of art-school classes. ‘The models we had to draw were so unattractive. They weren’t ugly, but there was no delight in what they were doing. They were freezing cold and lifeless. We might as well have been drawing waxed fruit.’
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Her eureka moment – that she should combine life drawing classes with cabaret for London’s thrill-seeking pub-goers – was followed by some investigative Googling. Amazingly, an American burlesque performer by the name of Molly Crabapple had had the very same idea in 2005, and was running successful bi-monthly salons in New York’s watering holes. Encouraged by the rave reviews Crabapple was receiving, Ruka jacked in her studies and applied for a franchise.

Mark picks up his runner-up prize

It paid off. After a promising debut at cabaret club Volupté near Chancery Lane, Dr Sketchy’s London has found its regular home at the Oh! Bar on Camden High Street. It’s the perfect venue: nervous first-timers can kick-start their creative juices at the airy bar before slipping behind the safety of a red velvet curtain for an afternoon of artistic bedlam. There’s even a Woolworths next door, where you can pick up last-minute art supplies. My own £2 sketch block bears the tell-tale smudges of a delicious starter platter from the Oh! Bar’s in-house Thai kitchen.

Not that the odd splodge of chilli sauce does much to detract from my frankly pitiful first attempts at life drawing. The pace, as set by ebullient compere Mr Dusty Limits, is frantic.

A vision himself in a chequered cravat and eyeliner, Dusty introduces our model for the afternoon: established burlesque artiste Red Sarah. Sarah performs a ravishing fan dance to music before striking a pose worthy of Dietrich – if Dietrich had been allowed the creative freedom to wear nothing but a Miss Piggy snout and Kermit the Frog panties. The first challenge is to sketch Sarah without looking at the page – the perfect ice-breaker for a group made up of art students as well as novices, as results are uniformly risible. Other zany tasks, none of which last for more than ten minutes, separate the Magrittes from the chaff, however. They include imagining our naked muse on a visit to meet the Queen and Prince Philip, and remodelling her in the form of a household appliance. My own response to the latter – Sarah as a crimson Aga, complete with snoozing Labrador puppy – betrays my less-than-bohemian credentials, and is held up for ridicule by our host. Not that I mind – I’m having a whale of a time.

Whimsical as Dr Sketchy’s may at first appear, it dawns on me that we’re being encouraged to reconsider our, often school-taught, preconceptions about what makes a ‘good’ picture. Dusty and co are as nurturing as they are entertaining, awarding prizes (shot glasses, oil paints) for technical accomplishment, but also for imaginative flair – and after three hours solid drinking, that’s something to be thankful for. As well as being a fantastic giggle, the process is genuinely liberating. The pen set I receive in recognition of my boozy effort in the final freestyle round will definitely be accompanying me to future Sketchy Saturdays. My inhibitions, however, will not.