Assignment four

Using line and shape

1. I decided to use chalk-pastel colouring pencils (CarbOthello/Stabillo) and a limited colour palette.  I chose the chalk pencils because as I was aiming for a line drawing and they offered ease of handling and I could achieve single strokes of strong colour.  The colours I used (a dark reddy/orange colour and a black) were deep and dark and robust.  I could get a definite line which would stand alone but I could also overlay the black over the red without a problem.  They would also be possible to smudge/blend a little and if necessary erase a little.
 
2. In terms of setting up the composition, I ensured the model was dressed in close fitting clothes and that I could also see parts of the body.  I didn't do preliminary drawings as such but I did make a couple of attempts at drawing the model in my chosen pose before I was happy with the result.  I had drawn the model so often that I was familiar with my subject, but I did play with the position of the model and the light source - which I placed to the right of the model.   I wanted an interesting seated position with the model doing something that they like doing (drawing) and so it had meaning from that point of view.  The pose says something real about the model and that was important to me rather than have the model pose just for the sake of the drawing.

3. I lay down a light pencil sketch to get the proportions and shapes in place.  My intention from the beginning was to then go over the initial sketch with the red colour - adjusting the proportions as I went along and not worrying about making changes and the initial pencil sketch showing.  Once I was finally happy with the drawing I then went in boldly with the black, again looking at the model as I went over the red lines again making adjustments here and there.  I saw this process as a way of working over the drawing first using the lighter shade of pencil - then red - then black and each time I could make adjustments to the key lines and improve the drawing.  I was not concerned that the previous, less dominant lines, would show underneath - I actually felt it would add a sense of movement to the drawing.

Finally I did add a sense of background and also some of the shadow under the chair in an attempt to 'ground' the image and give it some weight.

 

This is my image using tone:

1. I did attempt this initially with pen and ink but didn't feel I could successfully pull it off and decided to use charcoal which would enable me to add and remove the medium.  I felt charcoal would enable to me achieve the different tones I would need ranging from dark to very subtle and I could depict the softeness of the duvet with the help of a putty rubber.

3.  Again I knew what I wanted to draw, I wanted a nude figure and to include fabric.  I did preliminary sketches in pen and ink but as I mentioned, I knew pretty soon I would find this difficult to use.  I set up the light source and played with the pose to find an interesting but comfortable one for the model and once that particularly enhanced the light and dark.

2. Again I put down an initial sketch with pencil then I built up the image with charcoal pencil, putting in the darkest areas first and blending with a cotton bud.  Once I had built up the dark and lighter areas reasonably accurately, I went in with the putty rubber to get more random light effects over the body and the duvet.  Finally I used the charcoal stick to give a dark contour outline to the figure as I have seen other artists do and I like this effect.   I simply used the side of the stick to put in the wall behind and the bedstead.

 

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Self Portraits by various artists + check and log

Self portrait by Durer when aged 13, silverpoint, 1484.
This portrait displays such patience and skill in one so young.  Very precise marks and using silverpoint I think it would have taken a lot of time to build up the darker tones.

 

Self portrait by Rembrandt, 1630.  Using a much looser drawing style, I love this image which makes me think of Rembrandt having to pull this face many times over and over to get the expression.

Frida Kahlo "Self portrait dedicated to Marte R Gomez", 1946, pencil on paper

Frida Kahlo interests me as her many portraits serve largely as a visual autobiography, telling the story and events of her life.   She includes all sorts of signs and symbols in her portraits to tell her story.  In this drawing she has tears rolling down her face.  I don't know the explanation for this but the fact it makes you wonder, makes the image all the more interesting.

 

Check and Log

Which drawing materials produced the best results?  Why?

I am of the view that different drawing materials produce different types of result but I wouldn't place them as better or worse.  It totally depends on what end result you are aiming for.  I wanted a simple graphic look about my portrait and ended up using a black fineliner to achieve that end.

 

Does your self portrait look like you?..  The reason I struggled with this exercise is because I do find it difficult to portray myself in a straightforward way.  I was pleased I managed to achieve the portrait I did as I felt it did look like me.   I asked a friend and they confirmed it.

 

Did you find it easy to convert your sketches into a portrait?  It helped to have done the previous exercise of drawing the basic shape of my face.  It simplified my approach.

 

Were your preliminary drawings adequate? For me they were.  They helped me get a feeling for the facts about my face such as the overall shape.  This helped me when I did the final picture in that I started the drawing knowing more facts about my face than I had noticed before.  Looking back I  think that in the final portrait I did not convey so much of the the angular nature of my face shape which I noticed when studying my features.  I think that is because I did a straight face-on portrait which didn't emphasise the angles as another view might have.  But despite this, the final picture still captures me

 



Portrait from memory

I found it difficult to do this as when I do things from memory or make them up I feel my drawing will be childlike.  I decided to draw one of my children whose detailed features, for some reason, I felt I could picture better in my head than anyone else.  She has distinctively shaped bright blue eyes and rather than try and remember detail in terms of line and shape, I felt more able to picture her largely in colour.  The colour of her eyes and hair predominantly.   I think the result is not terribly accurate in the detail but it is undeniably her and the cheery look and the bright colours also speak of her.

A self portrait

For my self-portrait I was inspired by a book on Lucien Freud – Etchings 1946-2004.  One image from this book is of an early etching he did in 1947 of his future wife Kitty.  He titled this work – Girl with a Fig Leaf

I found this an interesting graphic image as a whole, I think due to its simplicity.  It is also interesting that each element is differentiated by the nature of the etched marks – the flesh of the face consists of stippled dots, the fig leaf is given form by simple hatching.  The squiggly lines of the hair really denote the difference of texture. 

I decided I wanted to attempt a portrait using simple lines, dots and other marks.  I made numerous attempts before I managed a portrait I was happy-ish with.  My previous attempts failed for a number of reasons, but each basically boiled down to my overdoing things.   I am a little averse to precision in my mark making as it takes methodical repetition and much patience that I am not sure is in me.  The main issue for me in this exercise is that I would overdo the marks and end up like I had strange marks or a rash on my face.  I also experimented with adding water with a brush to add more tone.  In this case I concluded I would need to use the inkpen more sparingly, as too many ink marks resulted in very dark ink washes and consequently very dark portraits.  After I had worked through the numerous attempts I decided to keep to minimal marks and just use pen (no wash).  I ended up using a fine-liner and here is the result. 

Project Self Portrait - Drawing your face

Quick sketches of face showing different angles of face and head. 

                                                                     (above) head slightly tilted back

Shape of head:

 I have a very angular face, a defined jawline and cheekbones



  Here I have determined that my jaw has three defined planes or angles from the top of my cheekbone to the base of my chin.  In the second image I have added my cheekbones and hairline.  The third image shows that looking at my face straight on, the visible part of the top of my neck begins from 2nd (or middle) angle of my jawline.


Looking at my neck front on,  the lines which run from the bottom of each cheek bone down to my chin (either side of my mouth) line up with the 'v' shaped line in the centre front of my neck.



The moving figure exercises + check and log

For this section I attempted to draw people in all sorts of situations.  Here is a selection.

Kids in the garden:

At the train station:
I enjoyed this as people would assume the same pose time after time - essentially looking up at the board or just waiting.

School Fair:
People sitting on the grass observing the fair.

On the train:
As with the previous subjects, these two people were in my view and unaware I was drawing them.

 

At the museum:
Here people were standing, pointing, sitting on chairs and on the floor, walking.

People in the street:
I was sitting in a café looking out of the window.  People outside were standing waiting or talking, walking and looking at their phones ...

 

Naomi - managing to sit still for a split second for me to draw her.  She adopted this pose which shows how unnatural it is for her to stop and be still!

 

How well did you manage to create the sense of a fleeting moment rather than a pose?
I think I did manage to create a sense of a fleeting moment as the people I drew were unaware that I was drawing them and so were not posed.  I feel I captured that sense of life as it is, rather than anything staged.

How successful were your attempts to retain an image and draw later?   I avoided doing that.  I only drew from life and what was in front of me.  I didn't try and retain an image and draw it later.  I think that I would find that really difficult if not impossible!  However, I did in some cases make up an image where one person moved off and another person followed, I would amalgamate the two where another person was doing the same movement as the previous person, eg a woman walking.

Were you able to keep to a few descriptive lines to suggest the person's movement or were you tempted to keep introducing more elements into your work.  I would keep drawing until the person moved to a degree where I knew they wouldn't move back to the action or position I was drawing.  I would try and draw as much information as possible to indicate the action of the person, for as long as they were in sight.  But once captured I would stop.  I found I rather liked attempting to capture the person in a short space of time and if they moved - I would move on too. 

Structure

Structure

Source: Notes from a book titled ‘The Fundamentals of Drawing Anatomy’

The skeleton

When we look at a nude body we see only a fraction of the skeleton – where, for example, parts of it protrude from under muscle and push against the skin.  The rest of it we know imprecisely as a framework and structure for our organs and limbs.  For an artist it is important to gain an intrinsic appreciation and knowledge of this framework and how it functions.

Muscles

There are three types of muscle: skeletal, smooth and cardiac.  It is the skeletal muscles that are most important for artists. Skeletal muscles are attached to the bones by rough fibres called tendons.  So when the muscle contracts the tendon pulls the bone, causing it to move.  Many muscles are grouped in opposing pairs, so that when one muscle contracts the other expands or releases.  This action is most evident in the movement of our arms and legs.

There are two types of skeletal muscle, one lying just under the surface of the skin, called superficial muscles – and the other layered beneath the superficial muscled – called the deep muscle. 

The superficial muscles, together with the bones, show the underlying form of the body and their study is essential for the artist.

Skin

Portraits by Dürer, Rembrandt and Ingres, to name but three masters, reveal a fascination for the skin.  How much of the structure of the superficial muscle appears through the skin will vary from subject to subject, depending on how much fat they have on their body.  Similarly the texture and look of the skin changes with age, state of health and the position of the body.

Proportion

Artists like Leonardo and Dürer observed the human body could be divided up or measured by using the head as a unit of measurement.  This book shows the height of the head, measured from its top to the bottom of the chin, goes into the height of the body eight times.  This system only works when the model is standing straight, however if they are in a different position  we can use this same unit of measurement in a grid system across the drawings, using this proportional unit we can work out the exact size of certain anatomical features in relation to others.  I will give a very clear knowledge of anatomical proportions within the human body. 

 It remains to say that proportions can vary between individuals and the artist has to take this into account when studying the subject.

Posture
How we hold ourselves is controlled by muscles.  Like the skin, posture can tell much about a subject.  In other words ‘body language’ can communicate fundamental information about an individual at a particular moment.

Before setting up a pose the artist must have a clear idea of what he wants to communicate or express.  Rodin’s Thinker and Michelangelo’s David are famous examples of artists using posture and gesture to give conscious meaning to their work. 

Fundamental form
For a drawing of a figure to come to life it must have the illusion of volume both above and below the surface.  Fundamental form may be described as the volume or composition that lies below the surface of the skin.

Various visual ‘languages’ have been devised by artists such as Leonardo and Dürer to illustrate fundamental form, from cubes and oblongs to ovoids and cylinders. 

Below a figure is drawn according to the following sequence:

1.       Proportions indicated by markers and relationship of posture within the pose

2.       The posture and pose overlaid by fundamental form ie shapes

3.       The above with the addition of the underlying skeletal structure

4.       The finished drawing

 

 

 

 

Form and movement in a clothed figure + check and log

I didn't really follow the guidelines here.  My figure wasn't seated and I didn't use hatching.   I avoided detail and just focused on the clothes and attempted to give form through light and shade using pen and ink and marker pen

.

Check and Log:
Did you find it easy to approach the figure as a whole or were you distracted by details of the sitters dress?
I think I found it easier to approach the figure as a whole rather than focus on the particular detail of the clothes.  For me it helped to approach the drawing by aiming to achieve a realistic sense of form rather than saying to myself I need to particularly observe how the clothes sit around the figure.  To open my mind to observing all elements of the subject in order to achieve a realistic drawing, without focusing on detail, was how I approached it.

How did you create volume in the folds of the fabric?
In this case I used pen to depict lines and creases and I used the marker pen to indicate light and dark to give the form.

Does the finished drawing give a sense of the figure beneath the fabric?  I think it does.

How would you tackle a drawing like this again?
I think it helped me in this case that I had already decided on the media I wanted to use.  I then considered how I would use that media to draw the subject.   I therefore had the nature of media in mind when I thought about how I would depict the fabric and approached the drawing in that way - letting the media dictate how I would draw.  The ink pen enabled me to put in some fine detail and the marker pen enabled me to add broad strokes of shade.  Had I decided to use a different medium I would have adapted my whole approach accordingly.

The clothed figure - Fabric with line and form

Here are some pencil studies of fabric I did using line only and then tone. 

A piece of creased taffeta type material with lots of
indentations.



Using charcoal pencil and putty rubber





 

Three drawings + check and log

Using Conte crayons

Using pencil then marker pen



             

Using conte and black chalk pencil




Check and Log:
How accurately did you depict the overall proportions of the figure?
I think I got overall proportions pretty accurate.
Did you try to imagine the sitter skeleton and muscles?  Did this help you to convey the figure's structure and form?
I did try look for the bone and muscle structure and it did help.  Just seeing and trying to draw the outline shapes that depicted bone and muscle, even in a basic way with line or a single mark, helped to give a sense of reality to the drawing.

Gesture: Stance/Energy + check and log

 

How well have you managed to capture the poses?  What could be improved?
I think I managed to capture the poses well.  Identifying the central axis at the beginning, by drawing it, really helped me and particularly helped in achieving the stance or movement in a short sketch.  I don't know what specifically could be improved.  I am sure the end result will improve the more practice I do and using the technique of establishing a central axis so it becomes more second nature when I want to capture a sense of movement.

Do you think that your figures balanced?  If not where did you go wrong?
I think my figures are reasonably balanced to my eye.  I think using the same model over again helps in getting the proportions right without too much trouble.

How did you go about conveying a sense of energy?
I looked to depict the action so I focused on the action rather than anything else.  So if it was someone throwing a ball I would focus on the arms and the ball and the stance.  Focusing on depicting the action seemed to help in drawing it. 

Check and log

Were you able to maintain a focus on proportion at the same time as creating a sense of weight and 3d form?
I laid down the shapes and established the proportions before adding definition and shading to get a sense of weight and form.


Which drawing gives the best sense of the pose and why?

       

I think the above two drawings give the best sense of the pose.  Somehow the angles of the arms and legs help to give the sense of 3d form, once those were in place the addition of shade enhanced the form and gave greater depth.  So in short I think its probably easier to get a sense of depth with these sort of poses, than if the model is lying flat for example.

 

Was there any movement or gesture away from the model's central axis.  If so did you manage to identify this and put it into your drawing? 
Movement or gesture away from the model's central axis was present in a number of the poses and I feel I did manage to identify this and incorporate it in my drawings.

Essential Elements

I found it hard to focus on tone rather than line and detail so it took me quite a few attempts to get any decent results. In the time suggested of 10 minutes per pose I found the best approach was to establish the basic shapes, then add some contour with a strong defined line, then shade.  I did some hatching but also, when using a charcoal pencil, found it helpful to just add more pressure to get darker tone.  Below are some of the sketches:
(below - light source from right)

      

    

 

 

Below I looked to use different media - conte, pen and ink, plus ink wash on the last one.