Another day, another class. I was really happy to see the work that the students brought. They had storyboarded scenes. Each one presented their work, and I helped them with suggestions on how to play with various elements to push their work even further. It was great to hear some of the students chime in with suggestions as well. Teaching is exhausting work if you’re doing it right. I can see the hunger in most of these students to learn and try and do something. Many come from relatively far distances to study there. Most of the class consists of young women. It’s fun to see the excitement and fun nature of their personalities come out as they discuss their ideas and share their drawings.I try to help them create some more variety in their shots. It is challenging to draw things from various angles, and I have been helping them to break down things into simple shapes that are easier to draw from different views. I want to these kids to feel confident and strong in their art. They have ideas, and I don’t want to see them become jaded over time. It’s not really in my hands, but I do what I can to give my best. Nothing would make me happier than for these students to bring their imaginations to life.Later in the day, I visited my friend Shahid from CEAD, which is an art and design college here in Jamshoro. I worked with some students there when I first came out here to record music for my short film “Gul”. Now those students are teaching, having worked at several kinds of jobs and developed their skills. More phone calls were made, and no puppeteers were found in Sindh.
I visited Shaukat at his office at CEAD and got to enjoy several of his paintings and some really good videos of his more conceptual pieces he created at NCA. There is a lot of horrible stuff going on in Pakistan, but the painting scene here is very rich in skill. I can’t wait to see some of that self expression spill into the animation scene and find its way into more of the independent film scene as well. I wish I knew how to sell art. The campus is interesting and has expanded quite a bit since I was here in 2008. I took some photos of the cool sculptures in the courtyard. I hope these pieces will rotate out more often than the ones at NCA.
