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Talk and draw with mindfulness – Mental Wealth Festival 2022
Explore Gainsborough’s ‘Portrait of Margaret Gainsborough holding a Theorbo’ with Karly Allen
Combining mindfulness practice and guided drawing exercises, this session explores emergence and flux as aspects of the creative process. Gainsborough’s portrait of his daughter is unfinished – as if perpetually in the state of becoming, just like the music she is playing. How can we harness this quality of openness in our looking, our drawing and as a source for wellbeing?
This event is part of the Mental Wealth Festival hosted by City Lit, the UK’s leading adult education college, in partnership with Beyond Word, the National Gallery, Mind, the British Museum, the Royal Opera House, Frazzled Café, Mad World, Thrive London, the Conduit, and South London and Maudsley Bethlem Hospital. It consists of in-person and online workshops, talks, discussions, exhibitions, and other activities. The festival seeks to explore and champion the ways in which education, culture, community and the arts support positive mental health and wellbeing.
Your tutor
Karly Allen is a drawing practitioner and lecturer in art history. Using drawing as a tool for looking, she has lectured widely for London art collections and cultural organisations. Karly complements her teaching with her training as a mindfulness teacher. Co-director of Limina Collective, she is passionate about the potential for mindfulness techniques to enhance our experience of engaging with art.
This is a drop-in event with a limited number of places which are allocated on a first come, first served basis. Although you do not need to book this session, you will need to book your free Gallery entry ticket to gain admission to the National Gallery.Please arrive in good time to access the building and find the event.
Free. Click here for details or visit the website
(Image: Detail from Thomas Gainsborough, ‘Margaret Gainsborough holding a Theorbo’, about 1777. Image courtesy of the National Portrait Gallery, London)
