"Drawing helps us to really see." - Flannery O'Connor
If you need to add structure to your writing practice or writing work, need help turning an image into a scene or a scene into a story, can hear a character's voice in your head but can't see them in the context of their story, or just feel jaded by old revision techniques, then this class is for you!
In this course, we will borrow techniques and tools from the visual arts. While outlines might seem constricting or old-fashioned or uninspiring, instructor Cinelle Barnes will lead the class in using outlines, illustration, and other visual tools to add focus, depth, form, structure, and texture to prose. Plus, drawing is just plain fun! Your writing practice can always use more playfulness and joy!
No artistic skill necessary, if you can draw a triangle, a square, a circle, some arrows, spirals, and stick figures, you’ll be able to use these methods.
Inspired by Flannery O'Connor and other writer-artists, this five-hour class will be very visual and generative. You will watch Cinelle do five live, on-camera, from-scratch visual renderings of fiction and nonfiction projects. Each of the five techniques will be focused on birthing new ideas, problem solving and untangling thoughts, and expanding an image or scene into a story:
The five "techniques" are:
- Outlining an inciting incident
- Outlining a fragmented essay or short story using repetition, illustration, and index cards
- Outlining a main character's emotional arc
- Outlining an ensemble's or supporting characters' intersecting arcs
- Outlining scene vs summary using geometric shapes
You will need paper and pens or pencils, or a drawing tablet, to successfully participate in this class. You will get a chance to practice each of the five techniques. Be prepared to revise old work and ideate new ones.
Class meetings will be held over video chat, using Zoom accessed from your private class page. While you can use Zoom from your browser, we recommend downloading the desktop client so you have access to all platform features. The Zoom calls will have automated transcription enabled. Please let us know (classes@catapult.co) if you have any questions or concerns about accessibility.