Achieving artistic balance

STORY AND PHOTOGRAPHY BY MEHREEN SHAHID

He slowly takes off his robe, his nakedness exposed to the probing eyes. Doing a little pirouette, he deliberately, but gently shows off the most intimate parts of his body. When rapt onlookers have become desensitized to each curve, nook and cranny of his body, he strikes a pose.

Edward Czuchnicki, more popularly known as Ed Cz, is “art model” at Sheridan College, and his job is to pose for the drawing and sketching for programs in the School of Animation and Design. With a degree from OCAD, he worked as a technical illustrator at AT&T before becoming a full-time life model. He knows what it takes to draw and produce art, and sitting on the other side of the canvas, despite being a challenging and demanding task, is exciting and edgy.

“Modelling can be very difficult, because there’s that ability to move but it’s all mental that you have to stay still,” he says. “All you’re allowed is to let your body take a position and that position tells a story, and it’s like theatre: it’s acting.”

Even at 61, Cz maintains a lean and well-sculpted body with minimal body fat and flexibility developed with the help of regular yoga. He also does body weight exercises.

Being a life model is not everyone’s piece of cake: it takes guts, grit and spunk. For Cz, it was the perfect chance to explore his ability to communicate and express himself using a different form of art.

“The model is given a freedom,” he says, “and if you choose to use that freedom to do very demanding things, you can make it very physical. Challenging the people who are drawing is also important.”

He plays with light, emotions, expressions, interpretation, language and the form of communication. Holding a pose requires extreme amounts of concentration. If he’s modelling a beggar, he will channel the emotions to animate his face as well his body.

“Ed is very good at dynamic posing. He can take a pose that suggests movement and hold it for a longer-than-reasonable time,” says professor Tim McCormack, whose third-year life drawing Cz is in. “He is muscular and lean at the same time, so it’s important for students to draw the fine musculature.”

Most students at Sheridan encounter life modelling for the first time when they’re in their first year, between the ages of 17 and 19. The experience can be quite moving.

“It was awkward, because it was weird to look at someone naked in front of me,” says Arthur Barnes, a third-year Animation student. “But after a while you get used to it and relax and focus on the drawing.”

For some, the process of learning is more important and learning how to draw from a live model is crucial to being able to animate on a computer.

“I thought the nude body was complicated,” says Alex Boissonneau, 21. “It’s easy to trace but to draw raw from life is different.”

Anna Starkova, 20, feels life drawing is a de-stressor for her. “I don’t have to come up with my own ideas but just draw what’s in front of me.”

At the end of each session, Cz loves to walk around among students and take a look at their works. It’s not an exercise in critiquing the art; in fact, it helps him stay humble and improve for next time.

“My original impulse was to copy the outline, but I was taught to get away from that and not just copy the figure,” says Brendan Lindsay. “I found it really hard to develop the sense of gesture, but with time I learned to focus on the essence of the pose and how it tells a story.”

In his modelling career, Cz has been crucified, played operatic characters, laid with dead frozen pigs, and played Aladdin and other characters. Now he would like to flex his modelling muscles and play evil roles.

“Every pose is an opportunity to be the best. I set myself up for excellence and I think, ‘This could probably be the best session ever and someone could make the best possible painting ever,’ ” says Cz.

He is now also working on creating his own artwork. Up in his cottage in Northern Ontario, he used pieces of rogue wood to create abstract expressionist structures next to the lake, modelled after the works of artist Willem de Kooning.