Life Class

Wednesday evening. 7.00pm. The class is beginning. Life drawing, it’s called – which is an odd name, when you stop to think about it. As if people aren’t alive unless they’re naked. I am the model. Naked in front of some 50 people. Or I should say, nude. Because it’s really a bit of a performance, and we models put on our nudity as if it were a costume. Whilst being naked can be about being truly ourselves, it can also mean to be exposed, vulnerable and powerless. To be nude, by contrast, can often mean to take control, to command the space and to celebrate the body. Which, after all, is what all this is about – I mean, celebrating the body. Life classes don’t go in for costumes like skimpy underwear or what have you. This is not burlesque. Even slipping off a robe at the start of the class is done with a quick flurry, so it doesn’t seem like striptease! The first few poses are short standing poses. This is where the theatre begins, because if someone is just standing about they tend to stand in a way that’s not especially interesting! So the model tries perhaps to throw her weight onto one leg, stretch out an arm, that sort of thing. This has the effect of creating some interesting lines in a drawing. A good artist will pick up on the weight distribution and see how it introduces a certain tension and movement into a pose. It’s a chance for me to look around. The ladies down the front look like they’re glad I’m a girl. They’ll draw my long hair carefully and probably give me quite a serious face – maybe a bit of a frown. The middle rows – a mixed bag. There will be awkward stick figures right through to careful and charming portraits. Sometimes, someone will strike gold – at least that’s the way I see it. You see, it’s the small things that make a person distinctive. Something like the way they hold their head, a certain look in the eye, a bit of a quirk to the lips. And if you can see these things and draw them then you can capture a person’s personality. The reason this works so well is that it’s kind of what makes us love other people. Something distinctive, something that marks them out – and it’s also something that’s likely to endure into middle and old age. People are often distracted by the superficial things. But if you can see beyond that then you can get a glimpse of what makes human love so special. There’s a kind of magic about it – a kind of enchantment. Anyway, back to my scrutiny of the audience! A few men in. Men in a life class always look very serious! When it’s a young woman posing then they must put in a bit of an effort to suggest that they’re not enjoying themselves too much! It means they can be quite difficult to read. But there are a few who will go for the ‘idealised body’ kind of drawing – an image that most women find difficult to live up to in real life – if indeed we were ever inclined to try. Into the second half. Longer poses, lying down. Try not to lie down the way we might normally lie down in bed or on a sofa! It produces what I call the ‘beached whale’ look! Instead, pull a leg up on one side and lie on some cushions. This gives a bit of a curve to the spine and some good lines – a bit of dynamism, even in such a static pose. I wonder most about these men who produce the ‘perfect body’ kind of drawing. Do they have wives or girlfriends at home? If so, do they show their drawings to their partners? Some guys, if they can get away with it, will just lurch between one pretty girl and another, until they’re too old and ugly for anyone to want them. Is it this kind of guy that draws the idealised kind of body in life classes? I don’t know. But I’m thinking that such a guy would be better off not getting into a relationship at all if all they really want is a trophy wife. The problem is there’s such a stigma about being alone. And we’re not really very good at admitting what we actually want in life. These guys just follow society’s format of having partners and families, when all they really want is cheap thrills and one-night stands. Please don’t break hearts! But there are men out there who know what love is and have eyes only for their partner. Failing that though, there are men who know their own weaknesses and do all they can to rise above them. Will you trust them? And let’s face it, society is a weird thing! When I set off home from here I’ll be in a dark hoodie, baggy sweat pants and trainers. Black and grey. It’s a kind of uniform that everyone has adopted to look anonymous. And as if the desire to look anonymous is not puzzling enough, try venturing out on a Friday or Saturday night! Here there are young women dressed in some very puzzling outfits! I’m thinking that girls want to dress as superheroes, and I’m not exactly sure why. Perhaps we are escaping from the world into some of the fantasies that we’re fed. Perhaps the whole thing is to try to escape from the harsh realities of life in a modern society and try to be someone else for a while. I wonder how long it will be before the guys catch up with the girls. I wonder how I’d feel about city streets full of men dressed as superheroes. It’s easy to confuse fantasy and enchantment. The fantasy is an escape, whilst the enchantment is a deeper engagement with the world. The fantasy seems to play into all those superficial things that those guys who shouldn’t be married seem to like. The enchantment is all the more subtle stuff that consistently passes them by. What does all that say about society? To be honest, I think we’re a bit lost. But I hope I’m wrong. I hope that more people than I actually think are able to see the subtle stuff that makes people beautiful – makes the world beautiful. The class is ending and there is a final piece of theatre. The model takes a little bow. I take my little bow, and there is polite applause, like we are at an English cricket match. All this strange theatre! It somehow helps me know who I am, at least a little more. But it makes me realise we so often don’t want to acknowledge our pleasures and our pains. If we could only be more honest with ourselves – genuinely naked with ourselves – then we could stop pretending to other people. Would that make life better? I think so. I hope so.