For sketches and studies of facial features, please see Dr 1, Pt 4, Pr 4, Ex 1.
Above is my attempt at drawing an entire head. I found the reference photo online through google and I feel like it is quite a relief to have finished the drawing and put together all of the knowledge and techniques I have learnt so far. I am aware that there is plenty of practice needed to really refine my technique of representing a well-constructed and convincing drawing of a head but as the drawing above was my first attempt, I am generally happy with the outcome and what I have gained in terms of experience through the execution of this drawing. Upon reflection, I feel the eyes are too close to the eye brows and the eyes are slightly too small for the eye sockets. I also think the bottom and bridge of the nose is too small for the face. I would like to try some more studies of faces in my sketchbook every week to gradually improve my measuring and observation techniques.
Drawing groups of people is definitely a lot more challenging than drawing the single moving figure. Firstly, there is an awful lot more of visual information to take in simultaneously, without becoming overwhelmed, and secondly, thinking about proportions and scale for the overall composition sometimes needs to be done instinctively as if you think about it for too long, then the figures have moved and the scene and the moment/atmosphere may have passed you by. I also think that after drawing a single moving figure and a group of moving figures, that when I draw from a live setting, I am more likely to apply less detail to each of the moving figures in the group because I have more visual information and figures to draw in a short time frame unless of course a photo is taken for later reference or the figures are stationary for a long period of time, enough for me to capture the scene and the atmosphere successfully. I sketched this piece above from a reference photo from google, which isn’t ideal, but lock-down restrictions are lifting soon and I am sure to find groups of people local to me, who I can draw as a snap shot in my sketchbook.
The above photos of my charcoal sketches are a combined effort for the ‘energy’ exercise and ‘single moving figure’ exercise. I had a clear idea in my head that I wanted to express movement with big, broad and confident sweeps and strokes of charcoal. I used similar techniques in the 1st and 3rd drawings of the mountain bikers and a repeated figure increasing in strength of tone for the dancer in the middle. I had an experience back in Part One of Drawing 1 when I blew charcoal dust off my work and it looked like an explosive effect, I have utilised this here for my mountain bikers to represent movement but also to show the dirt flying out from under the tyres because of the speed and angle of attack I drew these figures at. For the dance, I remembered seeing a drawing by an artist where he left some previous markings only semi-erased in this work so there were repeated images of the same figure in this composition. I loved this effect and thought I could utilise it here to show the stages of transition the dancer was travelling through.
I will be constantly adding to these figures in my sketchbook, as the student handbook suggests and I aim to capture my single moving figures in a variety of different viewpoints and actions: walking, jumping, running, bending down, stretching up etc. Now lock-down restrictions are easing, I will be taking advantage of the freedom and people-watching where possible. I quite like the idea of using a technique of using a smudge-able medium so I can describe moving limbs with a slight blurring to the moving edges.
Here I try to experiment with charcoal and watercolour after investigating loose and expressive figure drawing through YouTube. I found a few tutorials, links posted below, and they inspired me to be brave and consider an even looser and more figurative drawing with a mixed media approach. I created a triptych of drawings as I wanted to follow on from the theme of ‘movement’ which I had an essence of gentle energy between each pose. I thought hard about all of the techniques that I had learnt from Part Four about the figure and tried to culminate them in these drawings whilst retaining a little of my own expressive style.
Proportions all over the place, forgot to check measurements and got carried away getting the whole figure drawn whilst trying to remember foreshortening.
rib cage too wide, lower legs and feet not big enough for foreshortening effect to be convincing, liked the painterly technique
Lounging figure drawing – watercolour
This lounging figure drawing was a big risk for me to take as it included a lot of challenging aspects, for example, foreshortening, convincing figure construction, accurate colour palette and application of the watercolour medium. I was aiming for a realistic portrait and I am reasonably happy with what I produced. I did a bit more preparatory work in comparison to the other figure drawings in this exercise as I was simply unsure and a bit nervous walking in uncharted territory but I think it was a great experiment and has given me the confidence to progress further with this and see if I can push myself a little further to explore this medium and style of figure drawing. I do feel that if I had stepped back away from the drawing before I applied the watercolour, I would have seen that the foreshortening isn’t quite successful in that the proportions represent that the head is larger than it should be if the model was reclined away from the viewer. A lesson learnt for next time. I worked really hard on trying to identify the structure underneath the skin for this figure drawing and I think if the proportions had been more aligned with the effects of foreshortening, this would have been a more convincing outcome. Next time, I would also like to have applied a bit more of a contextual grounding for the model as the shadows which suggest she is lying down needed to be stronger.
Seated figure drawing – charcoal
For this charcoal figure drawing, I played around with the idea of using the watercolour medium again once I had decided on my construction lines. I decided to go against this and opt for something a little more blend-able by my finger tips where I could grasp a little more control over describing the tonal values. I think the outcome is quite successful, although there is something proportionally, not quite right about the figures upper right shoulder and arm, and possibly the lower left arm and head; they seem a little too small for the lower half of the body. I like how I have described the light with the charcoal and tonal variation. I tried to add in areas of reflected light to give a bit more realism. In contrast to my thoughts of a heavier support for the model in the previous figure drawing, I actually prefer a really light suggestion of a table on which the model is sitting for this charcoal drawing. I think it is just enough to suggest there is context to the models seated position, but not enough to take away from the smooth flowing lines of the figures shape, form and pose. And for this reason, I haven’t added the figure’s shadows on the support she sits on.
Standing figure drawing – Indian ink and chopstick
This final figure drawing is by far my favourite of the three. It may have something to do with my natural loose and expressive voice coming through here. I found it a lot easier to transfer my construction drawing of the figure into an abstract Indian ink drawing. I used a chop stick to transfer the ink as I wanted a real edginess and abstract feeling to the drawing, an essence of the figure and something to be read by the viewers brain, a drawing they have to look for patterns to understand and read the image. I took inspiration from my experiments and studying of the drawings in Robert Kaupelis’ Experimental Drawing, Watson-Guptill, 1980 which I also previously discussed in Part Four. The support colour for this figure drawing is actually a consequence of using a lamp in the evening to take a photo. This happy accident gave me a great idea: to try using different coloured supports for my figure drawing. This would enable me to use say, a nude/neutral colour as the lightest tones and build up from there with darker tonal variation. If I were to change something about this drawing, I would suggest that the figure’s right leg came in at a bit more of an angle underneath herself as it almost suggests that the model is leaning on something to support her weight with her hip and elbow. I understand this would then result in me needing to adjust the angle of the shoulders and hips to ensure the line of balance and centre of gravity is maintained for this unsupported standing figure drawing. Other than that, if it is not too bold to say, I really like the outcome of this piece and would like to experiment further with different coloured inks and supports to see the different directions I could take this.
E.H Gombrich,The Story of Art, Phaidon Press Ltd 1984
The obvious starting point for me, to look at historical studies of the human structure, would be the detailed and thorough studies by Da Vinci. His attention to detail and realistic recreation of the anatomy of the body borders on scientific illustration due to his studious dissection work and detailed drawings, although, he utilised his anatomical drawings to great extent for his successful masterpieces which followed his studies.
When looking at contemporary art, and comparing it to historical anatomical drawings, I’ve found more of an abstract take on human anatomy, rather than a recreation of more realistic anatomical drawings; contemporary anatomical structure related artwork seems to be created with lots of different techniques to the traditional drawing method used historically and some with a vivid colour palette. I see a wealth of variation in colour, mixed media, mark-making techniques, abstract illustration, layering techniques etc. If I look at work by Lubos Plny, his anatomical drawings seem to be an eclectic mix of illustrations which exude a sense of cartoon-style execution; these drawings are more of an abstract representation and creative expression than preparatory studies for realistic figure drawing.
Proportions of the hand and the relation of fingers, knuckles, tendons and wrists etc.
heels and feet from rear view
Feet / Knees study
feet flat and arched, foreshortening
fingers and hand study, 1 hour
Skull studies, looking at scientific names for the parts of the jaw and skull
Mouth / Lips studies
cheekbones
cheekbones, pastel over pencil skull structure
A little sketch to see how cheekbones would look with a full head study
Nose / Ears, various positions and sizes, pencil studies
Breasts in tone and line, not really looking at proportion or correctness, just experimenting with the pencil in describing with two different techniques.
Looking at the skeleton underneath a figure drawing, angles, proportions, central axis twisted.
Investigating body parts combined in a loose and figurative style – reminds me Alberto Giacometti again
Blind drawing, I wanted to see if I could create a figure drawing of a nude female without looking at the paper I was working on.
Not taking the pencil off the paper to practice figure drawing
elbow studies
Hand construction, blocking in, thinking of joints like hinges.
hand proportions
Types of skull research
Some ideas jotted down in my sketchbook, Ideas to come back to for investigation later.
It becomes clear that once I started investigating the various structures of the body and face with the above drawing studies, I had absolutely no conscious idea about the proportions and certain body parts relate to others in terms of measurements and angles. The more I observed and studied, the more I understood how each piece fits with another, to create the overall form in quite a mathematical way. I enjoyed experimenting with different angles of some of the features as this gave me an idea of how the body parts looked in different positions. As in life drawing, you rarely see the same body part from the same angle for every pose.
Bibliography
Drawing the Head & Hands, Andrew Loomis, Titan Books, 2011
Understanding Human Form & Structure, Giovanni Civardi, Search Press Ltd, 2015
I absolutely loved producing this drawing and I feel that enjoyment comes across in the execution of this piece. I decided to take a risk and return to an experiment I tried for Project 2, Exercise 2, using a black support and picking out the lightest tones with a white medium, much like Tacita Dean. The free-flowing and energetic lines in this style come a lot more naturally to me than tight and highly detailed. I found that my measurements were overall, quite accurate, although I have reflected and feel that maybe the thighs are too long when looking at them in conjunction with the angle of the feet, ankles and lower leg but perhaps I am being overly critical.
I opted to try out conté sticks for this piece as I haven’t really utilised them in my drawings very much so far and I knew they would give me a more permanent and harder application than soft pastels with my current technique of applying them. I used the sharp long edges of the pastel to describe the creases of the netted skirt the dancer is wearing and the top corner points to give thin lines for the curls of her hair, the hem of the dress and delicate highlights on her skin such as the fingers and face. I applied broad sweeping strokes of black pastel to darken the surrounding space and to give a bit of depth and dynamism; I felt like the negative space was too empty for some reason. I used my fingers to sweep the white from the dancers dress, body and hair to represent drama, movement and energy. It reminded me of Tacita Dean’s ocean spray waves on her blackboard drawings. For me, I know the model looks unbalanced but I generally think this is suitable for this dynamic composition as the model is mid-movement, meaning the centre of gravity is shifting. I think I managed to capture the dancer’s transition well, and also a moment of explosive but gentle energy.
I think that the reflection below the dancer is light and expressive enough to not take attention away from the figure and her movement but rather add presence and grounding of the figure to her environment. I swept the conté stick in the opposite direction for the reflection to mirror the movement and I wanted to represent a sort of soft yet confident burst of energy with the pose and the light, to bring the eyes back around after travelling around the drawing.
I decided to combine these two exercises together as it felt like a natural step to look for the stance, centre of gravity, the line of balance and the tonal values with weight/three-dimensional form. It seemed to help me more to understand how the figures were placed within their setting, i.e. how they held themselves and which body parts where placed where to ensure they remained balanced. The culmination of blocking in the drawing, measuring/proportions, tone and form, and stance is starting to build up a good picture for me of how the body sits/stands or moves within the context of its environment but also how the parts of the body interact with one another for natural movement. The picture is slowly building in my head and I feel like I’m becoming a lot more confident each time I sit down to draw a figure. It’s almost as if my brain is working through the stages methodically, a series of techniques, looking for the line of movement, the basic shapes, the lightest and darkest tonal values, the energy, the line of balance and centre of gravity and slowly but surely it is getting quicker and more discerning of what to look out for when considering the outcome I would like to achieve when I sit down to study the figure.
With the following sketches in the rectangles, I made a conscious effort to measure as accurately as I could with my pencil and squint to show me the lightest and darkest tonal values. I also noticed, that with the strong lighting used in each pose, I was able to see more definition of muscle and skeletal structure than with a softer, less contrasting light. I considered how each pose was taken and how the central line would move depending on the pose. It was difficult but I overcame this by thinking about how the hips and shoulders interacted and therefore the head and extremities which would support the model, if they had a twisted axis.
I also attended an online life drawing class prior to this exercise and reflecting back on the work, I can see how if I had focused on the areas of study as above, the essential learning building blocks as if it were, prior to the life drawing class, the pressure of the time restraints between the model changing his or her pose would have been a lot more comfortable for me as I wouldn’t have felt so overwhelmed and disappointed that I didn’t ‘finish’ the drawing or create a convincing figure drawing which didn’t look unbalanced or unnatural in its construction. I understand now that I have to think carefully about which areas I would like to work on before the model takes a pose taking into consideration the time restraints. Since exploring these exercises, I have readjusted my expectations as to what I am capable of with a little time and practice but also how drawing classes operate and what 2, 5 or even 10 minutes feels like when drawing from a live model!
My approach to this piece was to experiment with soft blending of charcoal and go for a realistic figure drawing rather than an abstract one. finding the lines of movement really helped me to progress with this piece but also blocking in the shapes of my model gave me a real sense of how the shapes combine and work together to build up the whole form in proportion. It definitely helped me not become some focused on one particular area with detail before ensuring the rest of the body measurements add up to produce a convincing figure drawing. That being said, when looking at the finished piece, once all the tones and details were laid down and I remembered that I haven’t stepped back to look at the drawing from a distance, that the torso looks slightly too long and the left hip crease, where the thigh meets the abdomen, is too low for the angle of the pose the model adopts.
I really want to try to give this piece a slight edge to it as I was searching for something a bit edgy and maybe take a little risk with the composition. When I placed down the basic shapes of this figure, it seemed a little unnatural and obvious and I wanted to evoke some of the sensuality that this pose evokes in the reference photo which was of an early tasteful ‘erotic’ postcard, possible Edwardian era, judging by the style of furniture the model sits upon. I do find drawing faces quite difficult at this stage and I didn’t want to get hung up on it. Rather than eliminate the head completely, I wanted to add a little into the composition to give personality that the model emits by striking this particular pose for the reason of early erotica. I still wanted to retain some anonymity of the model as I felt that this piece was more about the angles and presentation of the form itself rather than the identity of the the model. Although this particular nude figure drawing is based upon an ‘erotic’ image, I don’t feel like it is too distasteful or offensive as there is a softness to it and I think the monochromatic colour palette compliments the intent and style of this drawing.
Laura Baker 522918 Learning Log - Drawing 1 