Television interviews
On 14 September 2018 an interview with Esther was shown on Sky News as part of a story on how teenagers can cope with social media overload and all the pressures to look perfect. This was done at a ‘Drawing the Star’ session in Hackney Downs, when Leo was modelling and I (Esther) joined in for a pose as well.
Later in the month a similar piece was shown on Televisa – a Mexican channel which is big in all the Spanish speaking world as well as the US. Here I am interviewed at a session held by London Drawing, at Waterloo Action Centre, with Valentina Rock and Steve Ritter also posing. A couple of teenagers who were drawing and Valentina were interviewed too.
Radio interviews
In August 2018, I took part in a live interview for BBC Radio Lancashire, discussing whether life drawing should be part of the National Curriculum for teenagers.
Newspaper articles
In January 2020, Esther was interviewed for an article featured in The Telegraph: Call for naked art classes to benefit children in UK schools. The newspaper reports:
Ms Bunting believes such lessons can counteract low confidence created by idealised images seen on Instagram. She said: “It’s very healthy, I think, and it’s an antidote to all that, particularly now. It’s been exacerbated by the use of social media. From a very young age they are seeing all kinds of stuff.”
She added on introducing life drawing to schools: “You can’t really start too young, because they are already being exposed.”
The article also quotes Anne Noble-Partridge, our long-time friend and comrade in arts from London Drawing.
Previously, in August 2018, Spirited Bodies was mentioned in articles by The Telegraph, and The Times on the theme of life drawing being a good way for teenagers in particular to improve their body image
In 2012 Spirited Bodies was featured in this article in ‘You’ magazine – part of The Mail on Sunday. The journalist, Lydia Slater, joined us at a big event with London Drawing, at Battersea Arts Centre where she tried some life modelling. She had already interviewed Lucy Saunders and myself, and as well spoke with three different women who were also modelling for the first time (having practised at our workshops previously). She captures well the uplifting energy of the event, and the variety of people taking part.
Panel discussions
I took part in a panel discussion at Mall Galleries in mid-August 2018, called ‘The Body Beautiful?’. This was a great opportunity to express my views on model diversity in the life drawing scene.
In 2013 Esther and Lucy took part in ‘Eating Identities’ event at The Science Museum’s ‘The Dana Centre’ – a sort of panel discussion with a difference; while the other two speakers presented, Lucy and I posed. I also posed some of the time when Lucy was speaking. Part of this blog post is about the event. The themes were body image in our time and through the ages as depicted in figurative art, also the pressure on women especially to diet.
Spirited Bodies 