CityView Magazine

24 | July/August 2018 V A R T S An artful encounter with a former president BY CRISSY NEVILLE Tonape was delighted that Laura Bush served as the live model for the lesson with student and former president George Bush. V ilas Tonape has taught art to thousands of people around the world for more than two decades. In March, former President George W. Bush joined that long list. Tonape, chair of the art department at Methodist Univer- sity, spent a day with Bush at his home in Texas discussing and demonstrating portraiture techniques. e experience, Tonape said, was an honor and a thrill. Tonape is an award-winning artist, drawing and paint- ing in both figurative and non-representational modes. His work has been exhibited in the United States, Canada and his native country of India. He's also a passionate and highly regarded art teacher, with fine arts degrees from the University of Mumbai and Texas Christian University. Tonape has taught at schools and arts centers around the United States and India. In 2015, he joined Methodist, where he teaches basic and ad- vanced drawing and painting courses at all student levels. rough the years, Tonape has maintained connections with former teachers whom he deeply respects and regards as his "gurus" because of their influence in his life. Last fall, one of those gurus – TCU professor emeritus Jim Woodson – called Tonape. Woodson said he knew someone in Dallas who en- joyed painting portraits and wanted to learn more about the process. Since Woodson specializes in landscapes, he showed the student YouTube videos of Tonape demonstrat- ing portrait techniques. Impressed, the student wondered if Photo contributed

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