NEWPORT BEACH : Class Helps Students Find Their Own Style

Hank Hastings walked up to the plant in the middle of the room, bent down to look at it as though he were reading a putting green, then walked back to his desk and continued to draw the thing.

“I was trying to find the purple in it,” said the Newport Beach resident at his desk, a piece of white paper before him.

Across the room, in the traditional artist’s stance, Lisa House was painting with watercolors, putting the finishing touches on her picture of a different plant.

“I paint for the fun of it,” the Costa Mesa resident said. “My sister signed me up. She thought it was about time I started painting again--and if I wasn’t going to (sign up), she was going to do it for me.”

Welcome to Mi Mi Sharon Stein’s drawing and painting workshop, where more than a dozen students showed up Wednesday morning at Mariner’s Branch Library on Dover Drive for the start of an eight-week workshop.

Some are beginners. Others have been painting for a while.

But one thing is certain: All will find their creative styles by the time the class is over.

“This is not the age of Rembrandt,” said Sharon Stein who has exhibited in Paris, Rome, Buenos Aires and Hong Kong. “I teach style, and the looseness of the stroke is what creates the style of the person.”

By the time the class is over, students will interpret photographs of landscapes and seascapes.

It’s not too late to join up for the class, which costs $58. For more information, call the Newport Beach Community Services Department at (714) 644-3151.