Buy the Book: I Can’t Draw, Art for Beginners

BUY THE BOOK:
Contact hannahtofts@hotmail.com to order your copy £24.00 ex. post and package.

I CAN’T DRAW… ART FOR BEGINNERS 01 – WAYS OF LOOKING 364 PAGES!: Follow Hannah’s joyous Art Adventure! now in a book. Hannah’s documented journey is packed with photographs, inspiring examples and colour. Inventive, enthusiastic, playful, encouraging, accessible… all taught in a sensational rural location. See Hannah’s unique approach to inspiring creativity in others: “The joy jumps off every page…a very, very exciting book.” Hannah wrote a basic Art foundation course for the adults in the village interested in doing something in Art, were scared but wanted to try…10 weeks x 2 hours on a Tuesday…”You could not guess a single person could generate so much vitality, bright positive colour and celebration of creativity….”

Devised and taught by Hannah: Designer/Illustrator/Artist/Teacher MA RCA   “high energy, good feeling!”

“Let the child inside you play.” I hadn’t anticipated how little confidence we have in ourselves and how this can stop us from doing something we might actually like.

I ran the first Art Classes for Beginners in our village hall with a boiler room for a basic Art cupboard in a small village by the sea; it was a change from Amsterdam. You don’t need to live in a city to learn to draw…but I had to be resourceful with the demanding weather, challenging locations and unreliable subjects; we never drew freshly wrung cockerels, crawling lobsters or my rhubarb at Art College. Luckily I’m spontaneous and like a performance.

“It was all such fun and you managed to encourage every one of us!”

Explore your own creativity… follow what we did and be inspired: experiment with  colour, making marks, learn to look, play with paint, let your expectations go, be bold, dare to lose your fears…no rubbers, no rulers, no right way, just your way.

“I learned it was alright to have fun!”

“great energy, working fast and big, lots of encouragement, lots of excitement about art…”

I wrote up and photographed everyone’s work in every session, every week through every season for my own love of documentation…it’s grown in to an amazing visual library of utter uplifting creativity…I put on a bombastic Exhibition in a Barn to wow the village…so why not print to show to share? Working with fellow graphic designer Jan Battem in Amsterdam, we produced our first print-on-demand book to show the excitement, progress, energy and pride in the first of a fresh, modern, accessible Arts’ series to inspire: WAYS OF LOOKING. Created in Scotland, designed in Amsterdam, printed in America.

It’s truly a human story… full of everyday people overcoming fears with confidence,  belief and joy. “I keep seeing everything around me with new eyes…”

In progress: ART FOR BEGINNERS 02 LOOKING AT COLOUR in an ongoing series working through the seasons and their subject matter for inspiration. This time it’s outside the comfort and warmth of the hall,  all on location. Devised and still taught by me: Designer/Illustrator/Artist/Teacher MA RCA