Tag Archives: Life Drawing

Gearing Up

After a hiatus of a year and a half, it looks as though our Life Drawing sessions will start up again in early September. Here’s hoping the rising variant numbers don’t interfere with that.

Supplies

In the meantime, I’ve been gearing up by getting back into practice mode and collecting supplies along the way. I’ve had plenty of time to experiment with new materials over the past 18 months, so my kit will be a little different from what it was when we last got together in March of 2020.

The biggest change will be paper. Be forewarned – this is a deep dive into options, probably best suited to those of you who draw.

Before the pandemic I had been using Canson Edition paper exclusively. It’s 100% cotton and acid-free with two deckle edges and two distinct sides, one smooth and the other slightly textured. It’s a good workhorse that accepts a variety of media. For my purposes, its greatest asset was in capturing the marks of my ultra fine (.03) graphite. The downside is it doesn’t show off colored pencil as richly as I might have hoped.

Scott, detail

This past year, working smaller & mostly in sketchbooks, I discovered several new options as I began working more with watercolor in addition to ink and graphite.

Stillman & Birn makes sketchbooks with eight different types of paper. The Beta Series is my favorite. It has a lot of great qualities: acid-free, bright white paper that handles ink and watercolor beautifully and, despite being cold press, has a surface that my pen seems to glide across effortlessly. Each page has some real heft (180 lb) so there is no rippling and it stands up to erasing without damage. Plus, it’s a good weight for stitching if, as with my garden paintings, I choose to go that route. Happily, it’s also available in 22 x 30″ sheets, giving me lot of flexibility with size.

I’ve also been experimenting with toned paper.
Strathmore 400 Series Toned Mixed-media paper (acid-free, 184lb, 9×12″ sheets) takes ink and other wet media well, while its smooth surface amplifies the marks of colored and pastel pencils the way I like.

Stillman & Birn Beige toned sketchbook, 8 x 10 inches

I also just bought, but haven’t yet tried, a Stillman & Birn Nova Series beige-toned mixed-media sketchbook. The 90lb paper will take ink and light washes, so I expect it will be good for general practice, as is my Global Hand Book sketchbook.

Bryan ©2021 Elizabeth Fram, Graphite, ink and watercolor on paper, 11 x 8.25 inches. Global Art Hand Book Artists Journal. This paper is also able to take a light wash, but note the rippling on the right, captured when I scanned the image.

Experimentation is half the fun, and it’s great to have a few new options. Whether or not we actually make it back to meeting in person – and I really hope we do – it’s exciting to think about as I get prepared.

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If you aren’t one of my newsletter subscribers (you can sign up here), you will have missed my notice that next week I will be participating in a panel discussion with 3 other artists who also have work in the ongoing exhibition Hidden Messages: Old and New, on Wednesday, August 18th @ 7pm. I hope you will join us – the details and link to registration are below.

Artists Talk

Signify: A Conversation about Meaning and Technique

will be moderated by Leslie Roth, with a panel of
Jennifer Davey, Marya Lowe, and yours truly.
The presentation is free and open to the public; register here.

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Instagram of the week:

It doesn’t have to be all about fancy, store-bought paper. Check out the work of @peter_rush_drawings. He often draws on the inside of cardboard packaging – a novel take on toned paper!

Copycatting

I sorely miss my group life-drawing sessions which have been on hiatus for five weeks. Figuring I didn’t have to factor in drive-time, I had high hopes for all the drawing I would accomplish during those extra hours over the break…wait, what extra hours? In fact, looking back on my recent “free” Mondays, it has become starkly obvious that the structure of a set schedule is a better formula for accomplishment in the long run — for me anyway.

Copy from Studies of Two Apostles and their Hands by Raphael (1483-1520) Hands are my greatest challenge, so that is where I need to concentrate my efforts.

I know I could make much greater leaps in my life-drawing skills if I were able to draw from a model daily for a series of weeks, rather than only once a week for however many months. Unfortunately, that option isn’t available. However, one of my fellow Monday drawing attendees reminded me that there is much to be learned by making copies of master drawings. So that is what I’ve been doing.

Copy of drawings by Abraham Bloemaert (1564-1651)

Considering the garden is popping and there have been plenty of other things vying for attention during my “extra” hours, I haven’t been as diligent as I should have — or certainly to the degree I would have liked. But these images are a few examples of my stabs at practicing, thanks to the work of Raphael, Abraham Bloemaert, and Bernard-Romain Julien. Jon deMartin’s book Drawing Atelier: The Figure is another excellent resource about copying master work. Follow this link for a list of drawing references I’ve mentioned before and am glad to have in my personal library.

Copy of Head of Wounded Soldier by Bernard-Romain Julien (1802-1871)

For another testimonial on the benefits of copying, read this wonderful blog post by Austin Kleon, author of Steal Like an Artist.

Drawing Life

It’s hard to put into words how much I enjoy my life drawing sessions each week, and how much I gain from them. For four hours everything else melts away (except for the background music and minimal chatter) and it’s easy to get lost in the moment and to think solely in graphic terms. I count drawing as one of the most satisfying forms of meditation there is. That doesn’t mean to say there isn’t frustration involved, but the lessons learned make every line, however searching, well worth it.

These thoughts from Roy Eastland’s blog , ‘I Draw’, capture the magic beautifully:

They are drawings of people and that’s all they are. They are drawings done for drawing’s sake (drawing as a way of thinking about drawing). They are drawings of people who were still (or fairly still) for maybe ten or twenty minutes. They are drawings of people but drawings of people are never just hand-made pictures of people. Drawings trace moments in time. Hand-drawn lines take time and the moment of their making is subtly replayed each time someone spends time to notice them. There are heavy lines, sharp lines, long lines, feathery lines… the variety is endless and each of them implies the presence of a thought. We change our minds as we draw and our lines capture those moments of change. We look and we notice something and we try to track the gist of it on the paper. The time taken to draw even the shortest line is there to see in its entirety all at once (like seeing a tiny life-span played out on the page). We pay attention to the simple presence of things whenever we draw. The drawing is always wrong. We look again and we make another line. Each time it is wrong in a different way but sometimes the mark is good in spite of its wrongness. Sometimes the line feels true or it does something interesting (something we couldn’t have predicted but which is more interesting than anything we could have predicted). It’s enough that just a small part of a drawing is interesting for it to feel good. As we make our mark we are bringing into play all our momentary perceptions, all our skill and memories of all the other drawings we have ever seen. Eventually the time is up and the pose ends and all that remains of the moment, and of the protagonists, is the drawing. One day the drawing will be the only thing left of that moment. Perhaps we make ghosts when we draw.

Figuring It Out

If there’s one thing that stands out as “best decision of 2018, so far”, it would have to be joining the life drawing group I’ve been attending on Mondays. It’s exciting and humbling and one of best the learning experiences I’ve had in a long time.

John 1

If I can remember, I like to take photos of my progress during our breaks. Doing so is a great learning tool for looking back later to see how the drawing progressed, and when it may have veered off beyond the point of no return.

John 2

A not-altogether-unexpected perk is that it’s an excuse to buy new art supplies. I spent a silly amount of time in the pencil aisle at Dick Blick when were were in San Francisco last month, and a couple of weeks ago decided to treat myself to a lightweight travel easel. There is a world of difference between having my board upright and stationery, and propping it against a chair with my knees! John 3

The model holds only one pose per full session, but the sittings are in 20 minute increments with 5 minute breaks in between. John was especially good. He had a remarkable memory for getting back into position and kindly offered an extra five minutes each time the timer went off in case anyone needed to finish what they were working on.

He brought all sorts of woodsman-like props, and even offered to bring his chainsaw in from his car if we wished! Could it get any better?

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Katherine Tyrrell of Making a Mark is developing a page on the Art Business Info for Artists section of her blog that will hopefully become a series of interviews with professional artists about the reality of their working lives. The debut post with Catherine Ingleby covers some worthwhile ground. I was especially interested in the section on how Ingleby allocates her time. Something else may resonate with you.

Searching Through Line

There is a light covering of snow on everything today, making the fields look like fresh sheets of paper.

One of the many gifts our dog Quinn has bestowed upon me is being an insistent impetus for stopping whatever else is in the works at 2:30pm to make sure I get outside to enjoy the day. As she runs and sniffs on the new snow, her tracks break through the smooth surface leaving a chaotic trail telling of her excitement as she follows – here, there, and everywhere – the scattered scents of the various critters that share our hill. It reminds me of Bill Keane’s comic strip Family Circus that occasionally displayed a wandering dotted line showing the vast amount of ground covered by 7-year old Billy as he distractedly went from point A to point B.

When I look at my life drawings I see a comparable trail of graphite. The lines are searching and sometimes scattered, marking my numerous attempts to grasp just the right angle or shape while leaving behind a recording of the full experience.

I don’t begrudge myself these explorations because without them I’ll never improve. In fact, it is a similar probing quality that attracts me to master drawings. Unlike a polished rendering, an amended line speaks to the presence of the artist and his journey through his drawing, leaving tracks for the rest of us to follow and to learn from. Needless to say, it’s also reassuring to see that even the best don’t always get it right on the first stab.

Take a look at Charley Parker’s blog Lines and Colors. Not only does it promise a wealth of interesting and far-reaching information, but this post about Whistler’s drypoint etching of Joanna Hiffernan is particularly pertinent to this discussion about a searching line. Even better, the ghost face of a previously begun etching, that Whistler didn’t bother to conceal before starting over with this particular drawing, is a wonderful example of a “map” left behind for the rest of us to discover and to enjoy.

Back in the (Drawing Horse) Saddle

It’s pretty shocking when I stop to realize just how many years it’s been since I last devoted several continuous hours to drawing a figure. Lately the urge to get back to it has been really niggling at me, spurred by the growing toehold regular sketching has nurtured. For more than a year I’ve been on the lookout for a figure drawing gathering that would mesh with my schedule.

In Process The majority of my sketchbooks are approximately A4 or A5. Stretching out on an 18 x 24 inch sheet is pure luxury.

Thanks to a couple of friends who tipped me off to a (kinda-sorta) local group, I was able to attend my first life drawing session this past week. I am beyond excited! For 4+ hours I felt like that proverbial clam, snuggled in at high tide, while drawing in the congenial company of a collection of accomplished and welcoming artists who have been meeting regularly for quite some time. The model was superb and there was even jazz playing in the background. Seriously, I was beyond happy.

In Process The model gets regular breaks, which is also a good time to reassess direction. Taking pictures with my phone mid-process is incredibly helpful, allowing for the distance necessary to identify areas that may need to change.

As something of a resource nerd I’m grateful for the library I’ve amassed over the years, pulling the following books/periodicals from my shelf for self-imposed homework. I would recommend any of them if you’re looking for drawing information and inspiration.

The Visual Language of Drawing – James L. McElhinney & the Instructors of The Art Students League of New York

The Natural Way to Draw – Nicolaides

Drawing Atelier: The Figure – Jon de Martin

Drawing magazine

Working larger gives me a greater opportunity to consider how shapes define not just the image, but also the way they support an abstracted definition of the composition. Thinking along those lines as I’ve been stitching this week has made me even more aware of the possible parallels between my drawn and stitched work, and the symbiosis (in my mind, at least) that links both disciplines, which makes working back and forth all the richer.

Instagram continues to be a wonderful resource. Check out @ronniecay, @bobart1937, & @kevinwueste They all regularly post work from their life drawing sessions. The variety of style and interpretation is quite inspiring.