The best way to describe "In the name of Meera" would be an art school where not only the GRAMMAR of art is taught but also the very delicate path of becoming an artist is dealt upon. Apart from that, we also provide a platform to showcase the work of various artists and encourage positive interaction between them.There are basically five categories of paintings taught here

• oil pastels/crayon
• pencil shading
• water colour
• acrylic
• oil paint

The artists are divided among different groups based on their knowledge of the fundamentals. Starting from the "STARTERS" which include the kids who have recently joined and are new to the techniques to the "WHY DO I DRAW" group which consists of mature grown ups expressing themselves through their art.

The Generic Curriculum

Groups

Starters- Those kids who have recently joined the class and are new to the techniques.

Colors- Belongs to the kids who have got decent hand balance and are currently doing full page coloring. Their shapes are almost perfect.

Drawing- These kids are confident about coloring and are practicing the art of sketching now. No 'join the dots' for them. Their domain starts from drawing simple drawings and coloring them to drawing full page drawing and coloring.

Drawing Advance- This group is to make the kids independently finish a work. Step by step process is discarded here.

Shaders- Here the effect of light is introduced. Technically the students learn to vary their hand balance. Also, they understand the role light plays in bringing the painting closer to reality.

Shaders advance- Shading using pencil.

Portrait- Right from the features of a human face to complex human faces.

Water Color- For those who have completed the curriculum of oil pastels and are into the basics of water color; includes scenery and still life. Basics of human figures are taught here.

Acrylic- Fundamentals of acrylic medium are covered.  Basics of animals and birds are also dealt in detail.

Oil paint- Consists of grown ups and those who have completed the curriculum till acrylic.

Now, what happens in the class? Is there a process to teaching art? Is there a GRAMMAR? Of course! Although, there are a lot of impromptu subjects and current events dealt from time to time, by and large we stuck to a well researched curriculum which is inspired by two of the best universities on earth-

    New York Academy of Art

    Santa Reparate International School of Art Florence, Italy.

From 2016, we have come up with a new approach of evaluating all our students on each class basis. We  maintain a database of each student's performance through out the year which is shared with the guardian on request. 

The students are evaluated primarily on 4 factors-

-Technical

-Temperamental

-Attendance

- Homework

Technical

Following are the important factors which comes under technical-

Hand Discipline-

This is an important factor for a neat coloring approach. This also takes care of hand movement.

Hand Control-

This is a basic factor behind sketching and drawing. A good hand control is also required in higher groups like water color.

Hand balance-

A very important parameter for coloring, sketching and shading. 

Temperamental

Following are the important factors of this section-

Temperament- Sitting posture, white spaces in Hand discipline exercises, stationary brought to the class and  whether the student is enjoying the process of learning art.

Observation- Attentiveness of the student.

Attendance

We  keep a tab on the attendance of each student an motivate student to compensate their absence. Attendance is the only factor deciding participation of the student in the exhibition.

Uninformed absenteeism is highly criticized and even a single instance of uninformed absenteeism would result in disqualification from the exhibition followed by blacklisting from our classes.

Homework

HW is mandatory. Apart from weekly HW, there are activities like artist of the month, teacher's challenge etc.

The curriculum is divided into 2 broad catagories-

• Training of the hand (starters, colors, drawing, drawing adv, shaders)
• Training of the eyes ( shaders, portrait, water color, acrylic and oil paint)

1. Basic colouring- HAND DISCIPLINE- STARTERS AND COLORS GROUP

• Introduction to "directional" coloring.
• Coloring objects, flowers, simple sceneries- to understand the direction of colouring and get disciplined to follow one direction at a time.
•  Fruits and vegetables.
•  Moderately complex drawings- colouring full page drawings while following directions.

2. Introduction to drawing- HAND CONTROL AND HAND BALANCE- DRAWING GROUP

• Exercises aiming to improve the balance of hand.
•  Drawing small and simple objects and colouring them.
• Drawing and colouring simple sceneries- Introducing the approach to a scenery and multi subjects' drawing.

3. Introduction to drawing and coloring independently-  DRAWING ADVANCE GROUP

• Simple drawings with multiple colours mixed.
• Moderately complex drawing.

***student should be comfortable at drawing and coloring simple scenery and moderately complex objects. The drawing should be light and coloring should not have irregular balancing.***

4. Introduction to shading and affect of light- SHADERS

• Basics of shading
• Simple drawings having shading.
• Still life
• Complex drawings- with complex effect of light

5. Pencil shading and Pen shading

Topics covered are-

• Simple scenery
• Flowers
• Monuments
• Vehicles 
• Birds
• Animals

6. Portraits

• Features of the faces.
• Simple portraits without shading.
• Real life portraits with pencil shading.
• Pen portrait
• Portraits with oil pastels.

***READY TO BECOME "STUDENT OF OIL PASTELS/PENCIL"***  

7. Basics of water colours.

• Techniques of water colour- wow, wod, dod
• Shading.

8. Simple sceneries, still life in water colour.

9. Complex work with shading in water color.

10. Human figures

• Features of human figures.
• Different types of human figures- shading with pencil, coloring with water color.
• Sceneries with human figure as the main subject.

11. Portraits in water color

***READY TO BECOME "STUDENT OF WATER COLOUR"***

12. Basic techniques of the medium- working on canvas

13. Complex work using acrylic

14. Animals and Birds

• Basic structure and anatomy.
• Pencil sketches of animals and birds.
• Oil pastel sceneries having animals and birds.
• Water colour sceneries having animals and birds.
• Acrylic of animals and birds.

*** READY TO BECOME STUDENT OF ACRYLIC*** 

15. Basics of oil paints

• Basic oil paint techniques.

 16. Painting flesh- variation of skin ranging from human to animals to fruits and vegetables.

17. Large size painting of Still Life.

18. Large size figure painting from pictures.

19. Large size figurs paintings using models.

20. "On-the-site" painting.

21. World famous paintings.

22. Large size work using artists' imagination

***READY TO BECOME "STUDENT OF OIL PAINT"*** 

Once the curriculum is complete, the student will start their portfolio preparation to apply to prestigious universities of their choice. They have to choose from one of the following disciplines-

• fine art
• fashion
• animation
• architechture