“Being able to feel free to be creative is, at its core, probably the most basic way that we can communicate with each other,” says Don Swenson, Art Club Hammonton’s unofficial president and a founding member. “Even when we’re kids, one of the first things we want to do is scribble on paper and draw.”
Art Club Hammonton has fostered community engagement and creative expression for six years now, and its impact continues to grow.
The club is responsible for many events and initiatives, ranging from twice-a-month life drawing sessions and monthly open mics to annual arts and Halloween festivals, all of which are planned and executed by passionate volunteers. However, building an organization was not the initial intention: It started as an itch for meeting others and having an artistic outlet in early 2020.
As a professional in the arts himself — Swenson has decades of experience as a scenic designer and technical director in the theater industry — he understands the significance of participating in art, whether someone is an artist or not.
Right before the COVID-19 shutdown, Swenson was laid off from Eagle Theatre, where he was a scenic designer and technical director. (Now, he is the technical coordinator for the theater department at Stockton University.)
One day, he was sitting in the now-shuttered BreadHeads with a friend, chatting about how it seemed like there were more artists in town than were actually being represented and how they want to meet more people. They agreed that creating some sort of group or space to bring people together through art was important.
After the word passed around a bit, a group of 13 people met at the former Moerder Tattoos studio (owned by artist Sue Moerder) in early March to create a social art club. They launched a live stream series called Art Club Live that immediately brought in thousands of views. It ran until May 2022. They began introducing in-person events in early 2021.
One of the most notable programs introduced during the shutdown was life drawing sessions.
“I was looking for opportunities to draw myself, and I saw that during the quarantine there were a bunch of online drawing sessions that were popping up — some paid, some free — and then with learning more about Zoom, we decided to attempt to do something online,” Swenson says. “The first session was kind of a hit, and we just decided to do it twice a month from there on.”
Life drawing, also commonly known as figure drawing, is when a live model poses still in front of an artist or group of artists — traditionally in-person, but in front of a camera during shutdown days — for a duration of time while the artists draw exactly what they see in front of them. Sometimes, the models are clothed. Other times, they are nude.
In March 2021, Art Club began hosting the sessions in person at nearby locations, its first few being in the Noyes Arts Garage at Stockton’s Atlantic City campus. Other meeting places include local breweries, Kramer Hall at Stockton’s Hammonton campus, and the Vineland Historical Society. These locations have been secured through local connections and support, further aiding the club’s mission to embrace community.
“I did figure drawing since college days, and then COVID put a complete stop to that,” says Thomas Hind, an artist and graphic designer who was living in Mays Landing at the time. “As the pandemic was wrapping up in 2021, life drawing still wasn’t really coming back anywhere [even in New York City and Philly]. The only place that I could ever find anything was at Art Club in Hammonton.”
He first attended sessions that were held at local breweries, and quickly fell in love. His girlfriend, Grace, who is now his wife, would also tag along, and they became immersed in Hammonton, a town they had never visited before.
“Thomas went to these classes pretty regularly found such a sense of community that we began volunteering for their festivals,” Grace explained. “Fast forward to now, we live in town and are both on the planning board for the annual festivals.
“It all started with life drawing.”
Grace and Thomas moved to Hammonton last year and are expecting their first child.
Swenson says that the rotating locations help keep the life drawing sessions fresh. “It’s been nice to be able to switch up locations and go where people are, instead of asking everybody to keep coming to us for things,” he says.
He and his fellow board members —including Delfino Falciani, an illustrator — regularly attend these sessions. Swenson typically hosts the class. He and his fellow board members have become close friends.
Swenson will lead the group, which typically averages about eight people. A model will strike several timed poses, ranging from 30 seconds to 30 minutes or more. At first, the models were friends of people in the club. Then, after gaining attention online, more people with modeling or dance experience reached out to participate.
A frequent Art Club model is Jennifer Gordon, a professional dancer, choreographer, and the artistic director at South Jersey’s Allegory Dance Theatre. She’s modeled for clothed and unclothed sessions, as well as some themed sessions, such as an April session where she donned a fairy costume. At the end of the session, the participants, Swenson, and the model will all chat about their drawings and give feedback about the experience.
And above all, they ensure everyone feels welcome, supported, and proud of their work.
“I was super self-conscious trying and in my head a lot,” says Bee Fant of the first time they attended a session. “I didn’t know these people yet. I felt like everyone kind of knew each other already.”
Although Fant received an education from the former University of the Arts in Philadelphia, they only make digital art on the side. When they went to their first life art session, they were nervous to approach art in this kind of way on their own. Fant received so much support and praise from the other members, though, and felt encouraged to continue showing up.
“It’s a community that really fosters self-improvement,” Fant says. “People that engage with my work online all have picked up on an improvement, as well, a refinement in how I draw humans.”
Anyone can attend a life drawing session, as long as you sign up on Eventbrite and pay a small fee ($10 for one-hour sessions, $20 for two hours). No previous experience with the Art Club or even drawing is required or expected.
“Giving people a place where they are supported, can grow and feel a part of a community just fills my heart,” Swenson says, while holding back tears. “We have joked around since the beginning of our club that when people ask, ‘How do you become a member of our club?’ I just tell them they already are.
“Just show up. You’re already an artist, you just don’t know it yet.”
