Rutgers Opens Free Figure Drawing Class to Newark Public Through Gallery Program

Rutgers-Newark now gives free figure drawing lessons to anyone who wants them. Classes happen Thursday nights through May at Express Newark’s Paul Robeson Main Art Gallery. They start at 6 p.m. and end at 9 p.m.

Drawing Circle meets inside an exhibit called Drawing Room. Live models pose, and a DJ spins tracks. Students sketch with charcoal, and their work gets pinned to gallery walls when the group discusses what they made.

Layqa Nuna Yawar runs the sessions and teaches at Rutgers-Newark. Mason Gross School of the Arts gave him a fine art degree in 2007, and he took figure drawing every semester they had it. Four years back, he returned to Newark to teach.

“Figure drawing is a practice that is so necessary for any artist,” said Layqa Nuna Yawar, according to Rutgers.edu. “I don’t like to say I have talent. My brain works in ways that allow me to capture things with drawing more naturally than others, but it’s a skill we can all have.”

Yawar created 15 murals around Newark. Two show Paul Robeson at the gallery entrance. One huge piece hangs in Terminal A at Newark Liberty International Airport.

Nick Kline is co-director of Express Newark and teaches photography at Rutgers-Newark. He sees the exhibit as social sculpture — art built through people working together.

“It is an art installation in the tradition of social sculpture — art that is shaped through collective participation,” said Kline. “I liken it to the Fluxus Movement or ‘happenings’ of the 1960s that included multiple performance-based works at the same time.”

Victorian drawing rooms inspired this idea. Those old spaces brought people together. Anthony Alvarez directs education at Express Newark and thinks these spots let visitors experiment.

Last spring, over 30 people showed up for a test run of the class. A Rutgers Creative Catalyst Grant paid for it, and the BOLD Women’s Leadership Program helped make it happen.

Glyvolner Gabriel came to his first session on Jan. 29. This Newark resident is 35 and coaches tai chi and meditation.

“To be in this luxurious environment felt really good. I was grounded and inspired by the open space to create,” said Gabriel. “It’s an ephemeral experience. You have to be there to really appreciate the art that was the energy of everybody in connection to the physical space.”

The gallery stays open from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Mondays and Wednesdays when no classes meet. Tuesday evening sessions are only for enrolled students.

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