Life drawing – class 3

December 2, 2012 at 17:08 (Classes)

Half way through our classes after tonights session, so got to make the most of every second. That’s how much I’m loving this!

We did some loosening-up warm-up sketches of the model to start with. I tried a few different things, and was using willow charcoal for a change. It’s very soft compared to the compressed charcoal pencil I’d previously been using. I tried some new things, and looked at the paper more. I found that hard, looking at the paper too much. It meant I stopped and started a lot, lost time thinking and worried about things too much. Here’s one of the efforts…

Warmup sketch 1 minute – compressed charcoal pencil

Then we moved onto the longer poses. Aine introduced us to the work of Seurat, post-impressionist and creator or pointillism. He made some very fine tonal studies and we were going to have a go at using this for our first sketch. Aine demonstrated for us firstly. By using willow charcoal she covered the entire paper in black. Then using an eraser she began to sketch the model, not by adding colour or tone but by removing it from the black charcoal already laid down. This was incredibly exciting.

So, we gave it a go, creating lots of charcoal dust in the process!

Here we were creating the lighter areas of the model by removing more or less of the black, and in some ways that is easier than adding colour to the paper. You can easily put more charcoal on if you rubbed away too much. Sometimes it’s hard to cover up too much oil pastel or neat ink.

Here’s the result…

Charcoal sketch

I’m pleased with this. After Aine’s feedback I added in background verticals of window frames or curtains and this really helped. I almost forgot to look at the background areas of tone, and without them the figure looked a lot flatter.

For the second long pose we got to choose what we used as a medium from the previous weeks, paper or gouache as a base. I tried the paper again, for practice with collage. I’m not too displeased with it.

Collage portrait

I need to practice my perspective more, and find ways that work for me that don’t involve drawing outlines. I dislike the effects of using outlines, I think what I draw comes out looking very flat and 2D whenever I use just outlines. It is after all the tones that give it a 3D quality. So, more tonal practise and less drawing an outline and filling it in I think.

Oh, and I also re-homed a second hand book after Aine’s recommendation: ‘Drawing, seeing and observing – Ian Simpson’. It’s not a new version, but I’m hoping the lessons should be the same… some educational bed-time reading coming up!