EVENT 3 | The Act of Happening by Professor Paul Thomas

Tall chair drawing by Hope Pham on 8.5” paper using an HB 2.0 pencil.

On a Wednesday afternoon, I joined Honorary Professor Paul Thomas’s incredible workshop. Teaching from Australia, the ambiance of Professor Thomas’s call felt more like a session of meditation than a 3 hour long lecture.

From Michael Faraday’s demonstration of magnetism to Albert Einstein’s famous equation of e=mc2 to Pablo Picasso discovery of a fourth dimensional space to John Bell’s theorem to Alain Aspect’s experiments, Professor Paul Thomas skimmed just a brief historical timeline to guide our objective in capturing reality in the act of happening. That is fancy terminology for: we engaged in still life drawings. My own oversimplification of Professor Thomas’s lecture undermines the plethora of introspections that Professor Thomas lightheartedly and naturally imparted to the class. At times, it even felt like he had mystical powers of insight and majestic sagacity. He read signatures like tarot cards and tossed in humor so subtle that the entire audience clung to each phrase pouring from their electronic devices. To top off the atmosphere, a cacophony of birds gave viewers the impression that they were joining a tropical classroom, not their small, shared bedroom in Westwood. 

Pencil Talk

During that three hour period of enlightenment, Professor Thomas mentioned the property of transmission. He connected the substance of the pencil to the human body and subsequently built a connection between our shared carbon basis. This link was a novel realization to me. I was inspired to observe objects and people I have known for many years which mimicked the process of drawing by following the three steps: observe, collapse, reflect. True to Professor Thomas’s prediction, I found various imperfections. 

Fazeli Cellars Winery, Temecula (YouTube)

According to the instructions of our “chance location” assignment, I found myself at a fancy winery situated beside an expansive terrain of vineyards. My friend invited me to this venue for a photoshoot, and I found greater appreciation for my hometown.

WORD = HOME

Sources

Fazeli Cellars Winery. Temecula. 2021. https://fazelicellars.com/.

Pencil Admin. "Carbon and Ebony pencils". Pencil Talk. June 2009. https://www.penciltalk.org/2009/06/carbon-and-ebony-pencils.

Samir, Rokaya. "Chemical Elements in the Human Body". Eye on Science. February 2019. http://bibalex.org/SCIplanet/en/Article/Details?id=12462.

Thomas, Paul. "Quantum Drawing Workshop". Zoom. April 7, 2021. http://artsci.ucla.edu/node/1566.

Visiblespace: Art, Science and Culture. September 2015. http://visiblespace.com/blog/?p=1448.