Winter Experiments

The Winter session just ended at Manifest, so I pulled some pieces off the studio wall and photographed them. This is admittedly a mixed bag, and maybe I'll work into them a bit.

I'm trying to find ways of applying the pastel without obliterating the linework or smothering it with too much rendering.

I'm also trying to improve my color. Everytime I try to push it a bit, I get something unnatural or garish.

Another Oldie

Uh, the art that is. This one is from the old Court Street sessions about 4 years ago.

The marks are a bit coarse and the chair's straights and curves aren't perfectly formed, but I got a figure, some environment and a pretty interesting expression in just under an hour. I'm pretty happy with that.

Flashbacks

These are a couple of quick pastel drawings I did at Manifest months ago.

I particularly like the simplicity and abstract quality of this first one (above). The black lines are sensitive enough and didn't get obliterated by the chalk, which happens too often in my figures.

Portrait

I did this color sketch 2 weeks ago —the model was a first-timer. I'm not sure whose idea it was, but she took on a difficult 90-minute standing pose.

My particular view wasn't outstanding, so the full-figure composition was less than stellar. I took another look at it and decided there was something to appreciate in the face. At least one other artist, whose opinion I greatly respect, commented that I effectively captured the intensity of her expression —a combination of nervousness, concentration, and perhaps a bit of pain.

Figure drawing models are deserving of all the respect we can give them.

Fall Session

It's been a rough fall session at Manifest with one bright spot. I managed to capture this male model in crude slashes of pastel. I was paying particular attention to the values and only varied my palette in the last 10 minutes. The face could use some refining, but I'm happy with the torso the way it is.

The composition is a bit static, but when cropped, the image greatly improves, I think.

Watercolor

Three weeks ago I decided to switch media. Not because I was bored with pastel —quite the opposite, as I feel I've barely begun to mine their potential. For years I've been meaning to improve my skill in using watercolor —forcing myself to paint the figure in this challenging medium should help a lot. After two lackluster attempts, I decided to move to a larger sheet of paper and put in lighter washes relying a bit more on my graphite linework. This is the result.



The colors got lighter as they dried (something I'm going to have to get used to.) So I may have to revisit this, giving more attention to the modeling of the hands and softening the bare pate. Darkening the background should help as well.

Standing Male

We're halfway through the spring session, so I thought I'd post some recent images. I did this pastel a few weeks ago, and didn't like it much as I was working on it. After living with it for awhile, I decided it's worth saving.



I like the pose and the angle of the backlit head. I also like the slightly exaggerated nose. The bottom part of the composition got short-shrift, particularly the hands.
I'm thinking of adjusting the color a bit and putting the lower body mostly in shadow to re-emphasize the head as the focal point.

Three Portraits

Here's a trio of portraits all done during Court Street sessions over the year. I focus on heads when the face is more inspiring than the pose.



It's especially gratifying when I can capture the essence of the person with a few well-laid strokes.

Backlit Figure

This is a drawing I finished at the end of the fall session. Having the figure backlit is a double-edged sword. It can be interesting to have the figure accentuated with a dramatic halo. On the negative side, you find yourself fumbling for certain colors in the dark, and you really don't know what you've got on the paper until the session ends. This time I was pleased.



This was also done in the late fall. I think it's a nice start, but the details in the face kept me from fully developing the image. There are some unresolved hints of color and value in the environment that need to be strengthened before I'd call this a successful sketch. Great pose though.

Pensive

Here's a drawing I did several years ago during a Court Street session. It was a 15-20 min. pose, which is a nice length of time —short enough for an interesting pose, but still allowing enough time to check proportions and develop the mid-tones a bit.



Up till now, I've been digitizing these drawings on my tiny flatbed scanner. Each one had to be carefully scannedin 6 pieces and tiled together using Photoshop. It takes well over an hour to complete the scanning and assembling of each image, which may go a long way to explain the long time intervals between posts. This weekend, I decided to set up a tripod and shoot some drawings on the living room floor (which makes my wife wince.) My technique is far from perfect, and it still requires a lot of color-adjustment to approximate what's on the paper. Still, I hope it allows me to post more frequently.

Reclining Figure

This is another piece created during the fall sessions at Manifest. Just about an hour and a half pose.



It's always a challenge, but I like foreshortened subjects. I like seeing long limbs transformed into compact shapes not usually associated with the human figure.

Using Caricature

When drawing from life, speed is a required skill. It's easy to get bogged down with facial detail at the expense of the figure. Even in short poses, I like to create a reasonable likeness in the face, so I resort to caricature. To most people, caricature is a thing: a humorous and grossly distorted interpretation of the subject —like the ones you see everyday on the editorial pages. But it's also helpful to regard caricature as a quality of art (like drama and contrast) that can be used in varying degrees when trying to capture a likeness.



Lautrec and William Auerbach-Levy were masters at distilling a subject down to a few brushstrokes. Their art emphasizes key features not through distortion, but by eliminating anything unessential.



These three drawings were all done when the model was relatively new to me. They are attempts to focus on the face and learn what properties can be seized upon to get a reasonable likeness on paper in a minute or two. They are quick portraits using caricature in varying amounts of subtlety.

Seated Figure

The Fall session ended this week at Manifest. I liked the way this figure was going, although it could stand more contrast. I may go back to it and pump up the darks.



Eyewear really changes a drawing like this. It takes the figure out of the realm of a classical depiction and makes it look extra nude, if that makes any sense. Remember Donatello's David -the one with the hat? Same thing.

Figure Drawing

Monday night has been figure drawing night since I started freelancing in 2000. The downtown studio where this takes place gets beastly hot in the summer, so we take a 3-month hiatus. Of course after a break like that it takes some time to hit a groove again when sessions resume in September. I took a summer session with the Manifest drawing studio to keep in shape. I really liked the people there, so I stayed on this fall. At Manifest, they always do an hour-and-a half long pose, which gives me a bit of time to try the pastels. Here are a few favorites: