Life drawing 12/3/13

This week we have been life drawing again, this time using a male life model. We did two ten minute and two fifteen minute drawings during which I tried to focus on certain aspects of the model’s body. I used charcoal for three drawings and pencil for my last, more detailed drawing of John’s head, neck and chest.

This is my first 10 minute drawing in my sketchbook. I found it hard to get the proportions right on this and the shoulders seem too wide, however i am still happy with this first attempt.

In comparison to the female model, I found John harder to draw because he is quite square shaped; I find it easier to draw curves. On the other hand, I think John has more visible muscles which allow more tone and detail to be added to the drawing. I didn’t find life drawing as easy this week because I was unable to get the shapes and proportions correct.

This is the second ten minute drawing i did on brown paper using charcoal. I was pleased with the results because i managed to get the proportions slightly better than the previous drawing.

On my first fifteen minute drawing i did i concentrated on just the face, however i found this quite hard because i didnt get the proportion of his face to his hand correct and so the hand looks somewhat distorted and out of place.

My final drawing was done in pencil on brown paper over a time of fifteen minutes. I found that i could apply much more detail with the pencil rather than charcoal and therefore i prefer this drawing to my other three.  

A Brush With Spring

Over the weekend, i visited A Brush with Spring which is a small exhibition of artwork held by Whitepeaks Fine Art at Peak Village. There was a mixture of different styles of work from figurative to very realistic looking wildlife paintings. Some of the artists which exhibited such as Gina Marsh and Louise Jannetta i had seen before after working part time in a gallery last year, however there were artists such as Keith Maiden (a figurative artist) and Eric Wilson (a wildlife artist) who i had never seen before but found equally as inspiring.

Keith Maiden

Eric Wilson

Colin Halliday

Life drawing continued

Today, we have begun to do full body life drawing from a nude model. We used easels and A1 sized pieces of paper; newsprint and brown paper and drew using pencil and charcoal. The first two sections were 15 minute time slots where i used pencil to draw on newsprint paper, i found it challenging to fit the full figure on my page and i wasn't able to get the proportions correct. During the second 15 minute time slot, we were told to use charcoal and used an outstretched arm and a pencil to find the size of the head and how many heads make up the body. I drew on a line at the top, a line at the bottom and a line down the middle to help guide the proportions. I found using the charcoal made the drawing look much more effective as the lines could be freer which is helpful when sketching out shapes. The second drawing was a little more successful, however i found myself running out of space for the feet even though i had put down lines to guide me.

After doing some research into Leonardo Da Vinci's 'Vitruvian Man'  i found how important it was to split the page into sections to achieve the correct proportions. Using this, i split the page into 6 and a half sections (the heads) and measured where areas of the figure should lie. I found this very useful as it enabled me to get the head in proportion with the legs and feet which i had previously struggled with.  The next few drawings were done in charcoal over 20 minute, and two 10 minute time periods. I began to overlap drawings as the model turned after 10 minutes;  this would be a helpful skill for concept art designers who would need to create quick, accurate sketches.

For the last three drawings i had 5 minutes for each, after which the model would turn. I found these drawings the hardest because they were so quick, i think it was hard to capture the figure accurately. The proportions were rushed but these were the only drawings where i could fit the feet on.

Life drawing and Finger painting

Today, we have been creating finger painting images using inspiration taken from the work of Jenny Saville. We began by finding images by Saville that we thought were interesting and had a good use of colour; i found an portrait of a man where Saville had used a lot of green and yellow colours to create the skin. I liked this image in particular because the use of colour was both effective and appealing.

We used our life model, John, to begin our images. I began by drawing a central line down the middle and a line to signify the top of John's head, i then sketched in the basic shape of the face and finally some of his facial features. The drawing did not need to be detailed as it would be covered by the paint. I then added a base colour of white covering the area of the face and began to add shades of green and yellow to create a similar skin tone from Jenny Saville's image  This was quite successful, however i found it more effective to use strokes rather then dabbing the paint with my finger. 
I enjoyed finger painting; i think it allows you to be freer with the paint and doesn't give you boundaries to stick within. I found it enjoyable and appealing to mix the colours on the page, adding white to blend the colours better.