Laraine Armenti

student of painting

Edwardian Schema

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To celebrate the arrival of a new drawing pen, I used my Moleskine sketchbook to copy lessons from Drawing Made Easy by E.G. Lutz, originally published in 1916. His method is simple. He starts with geometric guidelines of outside shapes, then divides big shapes into smaller ones. Instruction in this type of schematic drawing was largely abandoned in the 1950s and 1960s in favor of supposedly more … [Read more...]

Goodbye Shanghai

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ARTIST RESIDENCY CHINA — SHANGHAI, no. 46 It seems appropriate for friends and food to be at the center of my last night in China. Wang arranged for himself and his three students who were my guides to meet for the evening. After finding the first choice closed, we had dinner at a Xinjiang-style restaurant. Later walking in the dark, we passed a group of people crouched in a dimly lit area … [Read more...]

Shanghai Old City

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ARTIST RESIDENCY CHINA — SHANGHAI, no. 45 The area within the original city wall of Shanghai remained exclusively Chinese during the period of foreign concessions that followed the defeat of the Qing dynasty by the British Empire in 1839. Unfortunately most of the old city has been replaced by a new city that pretends to be old — in a completely artificial way. It is a commercial development … [Read more...]

Shanghai Museum

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ARTIST RESIDENCY CHINA — SHANGHAI, no. 44 The Shanghai Museum is one of several significant institutions within The People's Park in downtown Shanghai. It contains an insanely sumptuous collection. No material escapes the expressive form and skill displayed by the Chinese and Tibetan people at the highest level of expertise: cloth, bead, wood, jade, gilt-brass, ink, paint, paper, ceramic, … [Read more...]

The Bund

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ARTIST RESIDENCY CHINA — SHANGHAI, no. 43 On my last day in Shanghai and first time in a week I found myself unexpectedly on my own for two hours in the city. I set out to walk the length of Nanjing Road to the Bund, mostly emptied of tourists by Monday morning rain. The Peace Hotel, formerly Sassoon House and Cathay Hotel, has a storied past. It was meticulously restored in 2007 to it's … [Read more...]

Scary Anatomy Museum

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 ARTIST RESIDENCY CHINA — ZHOUZHUANG, no. 42 Another thing that I did not understand, in addition to the legend of Wansan pork hock and the location of tea plantations, is why on the return trip from Zhouzhuang to Shanghai our next stop was The Museum of Mystery of Life. The bus group disembarked at a warehouse-style building. Tickets were arranged and a guided tour began, this time entirely in … [Read more...]