Free Virtual Art-Making with the Princeton University Art Museum – Inspired by Sculpture: Tackling a Complex Subject

The Arts Council of Princeton partners with the Princeton University Art Museum to provide free virtual art-making classes. Weekly classes are taught by ACP artist-instructor Barbara DiLorenzo over Zoom. With an emphasis on drawing with pen or pencil on paper, each week’s lesson in this series will be inspired by a sculpture in the Museum’s collections. 

This live art-making class is inspired by a pair of painted tomb guardians from the Tang Dynasty. These spirit tomb guardians (zhenmushou) clutch snakes in their hands while subduing animal demons atop rock plinths. The human-faced guardian has one taloned foot on the back of a screaming deer-demon; the lion-faced guardian is seen pouncing on a squealing, green-spotted, winged boar-demon.  

This pair represents the final stage of the long sculptural evolution of tomb guardians, when sculptors began to depict the guardians’ roles as defenders against demons. In this session, we will draw the tomb figures and focus on how to tackle a complex subject: balancing the art of drawing big shapes while also rendering fine details related to angles and placement of the objects. 

Free registration via Zoom here. (When prompted, click to sign in as “attendee.”)

This event will include live closed captions in both English and Spanish. English captions are available directly in the Zoom toolbar by clicking the “CC” icon. To access Spanish-language captioning, open Streamtext, where you can select “Spanish” to see the live captioning.

Para acceder a los subtítulos en varios idiomas, ingrese al seminario web de Zoom durante un evento en vivo, luego abra un navegador web separado para visitar esta página donde puede seleccionar “español” o el idioma de su elección.

Materials list for drawing classes can be found here. 

LATE THURSDAYS! This event is part of the Museum’s Late Thursdays programming, made possible in part by Heather and Paul G. Haaga Jr., Class of 1970. Additional support for this program has been provided by the New Jersey State Council on the Arts, a partner agency of the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Curtis W. McGraw Foundation.

Artwork: Chinese, Tang dynasty (618–907), Pair of painted tomb guardians, ca. mid–8th century. Princeton University Art Museum. Museum purchase, Fowler McCormick, Class of 1921, Fund. Photo: Bruce M. White.