Drawings Master Class

Instructor: Armin Mersmann

Mondays 6-9pm

Runs 12 weeks, February 3rd through April 20th

$210 for members $250 for non-members

Studio 23 is excited to offer Drawing Master’s Class with Armin Mersmann!

Experienced and advanced draughtsmen, comfortable in their technique, will learn to develop and enhance their personal artistic language. Focus and intent of an artist’s drawings are fluid and change over time – the end goal is not to execute that “perfect drawing”. This is not an assignment-based class and any drawing medium is permitted and expected. You will set personal goals and using a series of drawings strive to move your artistic language forward. As a class we will discuss the strengths and weakness of student work and objectives through engaging critiques; the class will include learning through demos as well.

A little about Armin:

Armin Mersmann was born in Remscheid, Germany, in 1955. Along with his parents, he immigrated to the United States in 1962. He grew up in an artistic environment and was greatly influenced and tutored by his father, Fritz, a successful oil painter. Mersmann feels his career as an artist was inevitable: “I never made the conscious choice to be an artist, it’s just what I did.” After six years of college, Mersmann began a very successful stint as a portrait artist in Chicago, IL. Although commission work was financially rewarding, he stopped doing it and soon found more interest in the fine arts—work that at times is controversial but more satisfying conceptually. “Art, my sanctuary, the very thing that gave me such pleasure, was now reduced to making a living. Art is too precious for me to make decisions based on finances.” This does not mean Mersmann will never do a commissioned portrait; rather, it has to interest him conceptually, and he insists on total control over the image.

Although Mersmann is mainly known for his intense naturalistic graphite drawings, he also works in photography and encaustic wax, which is much more abstract than his drawings. “My interests have become exceedingly experimental with more attention placed on the surfaces of the work itself. Discovering and rediscovering my chosen medium is the everlasting stimulus that keeps me interested and excited. Accidental process and meticulous planning co-mingle in all my work. Texture, either real or illusionary, and that one ever-elusive brushstroke, the one that says it all; this keeps me searching and exploring.”

Mersmann has taught drawing, the Creative Process, iPhoneography and Advanced Critique at the American Academy of Art, Chicago, IL; the Colorado Academy of Art, Boulder CO; Northwood University, Midland, MI; the Midland Center for the Arts, Midland, MI; and countless workshops within the United States. He shares a studio with his wife, Valerie Allen, who is an accomplished artist in her own right.