THOUSAND OAKS : Artists Share Costs of Life Drawing

The artists who get together in Thousand Oaks once a week to sketch portraits of models agree that life drawing is the basis of all drawing.

But some models are better than others, the artists said.

“If they’re skinny, we like them to have some muscle,” said Sylvia Poskovitch, a member of the group called The People Sketchers that meets every Tuesday morning at the Cultural Center.

Established about five years ago, the group allows professional artists to share the cost of hiring live models, Poskovitch said. Six to a dozen artists participate in the drawing sessions, each paying about $20 per month to rent the room at the Cultural Center and to pay the agencies that supply them with male and female models.

Using watercolor, colored chalk or charcoal pencils, the group members sketch the models as they pose in various attitudes for periods ranging from one to 20 minutes.

On some days, no model shows up and the artists take turns modeling for the rest of the group. When they do the modeling, the artists keep their clothes on.

But their professional models usually pose nude.

Just as Poskovitch prefers models who aren’t skin and bones, Louise Donahue said she likes to sketch models who are ideally proportioned. Drawing people with ideal body types helps her in her training to become a professional illustrator, she said.

Making someone look grotesque is comparatively easy, Donahue said. “Idealization is the real trick,” she said.

But Bob Duncan, a retired airline pilot who draws as a hobby, said he likes to sketch models of all different body types.

“I like the whole variety,” Duncan said, “clothed, unclothed, any size, shape or form.”