Laurie Babinski
I stared, my eyes wide with disbelief.
Was he nuts?
I skidded into drawing class Monday with seconds to spare, spotted a drawing bench and slid into it. Professor Joe Piasentin had just given all of us a fresh white sheet of paper, roughly 12-by-16 inches, and then he broke the news.
Our assignment was to color it solid with our pencils.
So we set out, somewhat skeptically, and scribbled until our arms ached and our fingers were numb. An hour and a half later, we had done it.
That paper was so silver it reflected like a mirror. I could see myself in it. Breathing a sigh of relief, I waited for my next instructions. After all, the class was three hours long. I knew that couldn’t be it.
Then he broke the news. Our next assignment was to draw the skull perched before us using only our erasers. I stared at him as my jaw dropped to the paint-laden floor.
Now, I was used to strange assignments from Joe. My favorite was our six-hour quest to draw a tower of stacked toilet paper rolls. And yes, it was quilted. Still, I was a fan of our previous sketches, the simple graphite sketches on clean white paper. I could handle those.
This one I wasn’t so sure. Still, I’m usually up for anything. So I, along with 11 other skeptical students, set to work once again, scrubbing vigorously with my Pink Pearl and kneaded gray blob, trying hopelessly to lift the dense graphite off the fragile paper. After a few minutes of udder frustration, our professor offered us a hint.
“You won’t be able to make that paper white again,” he said. “This drawing will be much darker than anything you’ve done yet.”
And it was. There was no way we could avoid it.
Since the beginning of the semester, we had been sketching and shading lit objects on plain white paper, creating an often too light sketch. Now we had to look at overall darker shades.
During the two hours we had to wage war on our piece of shiny silver paper, I began to think about the concept of light and dark and shades of gray.
It’s interesting that, especially as college students, our lives go through rapid ups and downs on a pretty regular basis. Some weeks are good, some are bad.
And since institutions are comprised of human beings, it only makes sense that it, too, goes through ups and downs.
So it follows that, as a reflection of the Pepperdine community, the pages of the paper reflect those vacillations. We’re honored to be a part of documenting what some call a “first draft of history.” In doing so, we hope that the overall shade of the Graphic is an even gray.
Our hope is that, by shining the light of truth into the dark areas, the dark shades will disappear in favor of the light. Until then, our pledge to you is that we’ll print both good and bad news. We’ll offer our opinions on them in the appropriate pages in an attempt to accurately reflect our community.
But the effort is reciprocal.
We welcome submissions for letters to the editor and opinion pieces and print them without prejudice. The Opinions section is an open forum. Our editorial policy and submission criteria are in the Opinions section on A14.
This week we have another assignment in art class much like the erasure drawing. However, I can’t say I mind. I’m no longer fuming at the thought of producing an entire drawing by eraser.
In fact, now I realize that that may truly be a more accurate reflection of life — no black, no white, just shades of gray.
October 03, 2002