Wild Life Drawing Online: Earth

Join us to celebrate Earth Day this year by paying tribute to our own extraordinary home. At this gentle, thought provoking drawing class we will explore how our Planet Earth formed, how it evolved, and how it can sustain life in the face of today’s climate crisis.

We'll be welcoming back our favourite guide to the skies, Michael Lomotey, also a doctoral researcher, environmentalist and passionate astronomer. He will guide us through our planet’s origin story—from swirling clouds of cosmic dust 4.5 billion years ago and the molten beginnings of a young world, through to Earth today shaped by shifting continents and tectonic plates. Along the way, we’ll add literal colour with a look at surface geology—iron-rich reds, forest greens, desert yellows and the blues of our oceans—revealing how chemistry and climate paint the landscapes as they can be viewed from space. Michael will also share some of the intriguing theories surrounding the mysterious, hypothetical Planet X (also known as Planet Nine), whose gravitational tremors may be hiding at the edge of our cosmic neighbourhood. Ooh!

On hand to help you bring Earth to life on the page will be artist Jennie Webber. This session will focus on capturing our beautiful planet – from swirling cloud systems to the iconic blues and greens. This will be a guided step-by-step tutorial from high-quality reference images, with a focus on using colour.

The class is open to all abilities, so whether you haven’t drawn since school or sketch every day, you’ll get plenty out of the session. All you need to take part is paper, a pencil, a sharpener and a rubber, and Jennie will advise on optional colours and extra materials before the class. But if you'd like to work along in other materials you enjoy, then please feel free to get creative. 

We’ll email you a Zoom link and the reference images ahead of the class. As with all our online sessions, a recording will be sent afterwards so you can revisit the experience whenever you like.