Yeliseyev Art Studio To Offer Drawing Classes

The eye of an artist can be a critical one, and Vladislav Yeliseyev would like to provide to budding artists along with a soft touch.

Yeliseyev maintains his Yeliseyev Art Studio inside his home at The Landings development in Sarasota where he does architectural illustrations for clients and also teaches drawing and other art classes as part of his Renaissance School of Art.

"Learning how to draw is a process that never ends," he says. "It doesn't matter when you start — you never finish."

He's offering classes starting Sept. 8 with openings for five students in an introductory drawing class — levels one and two — and would like to build and grow his classes and programs to have the students progress to the next levels of drawings to where they can start painting what they draw. Drawing courses cost $30 for each 90-minute class. Materials are not included.

"To be creative, you have to use your tools in some magic ways" Yeliseyev says inside his home on a recent afternoon.

For Yeliseyev, magic does not mean he uses tricks. In fact, he despises tricks in teaching art and painting.

Yeliseyev's approach is to focus on the core academic method of drawing — which means it will take time and patience to become a great artist.

"With the academic approach, you analyze the form and break any shape into forms — cones, cylinders, cones, parallelograms," Yeliseyev says. "You really build form from inside out."

Yeliseyev and his wife Marina founded the studio in 2009 after they moved to Sarasota along with their daughter Polina. Previously, Yeliseyev started his architectural illustration company in New York City in 1992 and had lived in Stamford, Conn., and the Russian natives decided it was time to head south to the Cultural Coast. This year will be the first year for his art school.

Yeliseyev's academic foundation traces back to his education in Russia where he received a Master's Degree at the Moscow Institute of Architecture.

Here, he'd like to help the next generation of artists by building basic foundations or even help high school artists help build their portfolio while applying to art colleges and universities.

He stresses that though we live in a digital world, having great drawing skills is still in high demand, and is often necessary to have to make great digital art.

Great digital art "should start with a piece of paper, then you move it to a computer and manipulate it," he says.

Even in his field of work, often sketches of proposed skyscrapers, towers, arenas and other projects seem to prefer the hand-drawn versions compared to a digital rendering, he says.

The beginner classes at Yeliseyev's art schools will be held on Saturdays for 90 minutes each and divided up into morning and afternoon classes for different audiences. Homework is also assigned to help build the skills to follow up for the next session.

Other classes offered including intermediate drawing and watercolor and intensive drawing for beginners, a four-week course that meets three times a week, said Marina, who serves as the school's administrator.

Though any age is welcome, Yeliseyev encourages that kids who want to become great artists should start at about 10 years old to learn basic geometric ideas.

If an artist, no matter the age, wants to progress, Yeliseyev says the most practical thing to do is to have classes two times a week and then practice every day if they'd like to get to the next level.

Though many of us try and try to become a good artist, sometimes it doesn't take, so what's some of the key hurdles that aspiring artists have to get over?

Well, there are a few, Yeliseyev says.

One of it stems from what he had said about the academic approach — building form from shapes. Most folks tend to draw the edges first and then fill it, such as a face, but it has to be done the other way around, and takes some eye training to do.

Some of the other hurdles are just the work area.

"The biggest challenge is to break the misconceptions of even how we hold the pencil — it's different," he says. And you have to hold the pencil different because drawing is done on a vertical surface and not drawing on a table.

It's fundamental practices like that where Yeliseyev aims to develop a truly academic approach to teaching art and not rushing along to fix a student's work so they'll have a masterpiece in an hour to hang above the mantel.

"It takes time and patience," he stresses.

As with art, the Yeliseyev family also practices patience with their business. They're starting small offering personal classes, and Marina says their ultimate goal one day is to incorporate and become a full art school in Sarasota.

Yeliseyev Art Studio's Renaissance School of Art

4600 Pine Harrier Drive (By Appointment Only)

941-330-6865

contact@yeliseyev.com 

View course descriptions and schedule of the Renaissance School of Art's classes online.