Arts Alive Summer School: day 4

Its quite a privilege to life-draw for four days on the trot. And there is still tomorrow! I am confident some pleasing evolution in my life-drawing journey will take place. But constructive reflection will take some time to emerge. In the meantime I am sensing that today I was entering something new.
The first drawing is a result of a definite intention: over breakfast, as I looked through my blog, I suddenly realised that absent from my recent 'anagram' contortions was a composition in which I had drawn the pose on one half of the paper then inverted the paper and drew the pose again, morphing the two into one form. So, this I did, and here it is posted in landscape format (I always use portait format for all my pieces). And 'landscape' becomes a relevant term to describe the result. A number of colleagues today said "Oh, Bob! It looks like a landscape" . So, this is something new.
I feel my aim in the second drawing was reached. Here I wanted to express the model's tall, long, lean body. The model is Liv. I have drawn her many times before.  I know her well. Yet it remains a challenge to do justice to her special characteristics. This drawing includes a number of (subtle) exaggerations which I feel do capture and express her special qualities.
Finally, when I was confronted with this pose, I just had to engage with the hand supporting the head and the elbow supported on the chair. So this is what I first drew. But the right hand grasping the steel tubular frame of the chair also had to be explored. This I did, but I introduced it in a new spatial organisation with the left side of the pose which I had already drawn.

Arts Alive Summer School: day 3

To start with a quick warm-up pose drawn within the ten minutes.
Then I sat for a good five minutes studying the next pose to try and understand the essence. I became aware of a number of curved lines, and then between the forms which generated those lines a dynamic. I felt that there was movement and gesture. And all of this was taking place within and between the buttocks. This dynamic and movement was aided by the angle of the right leg and a twist in the spine.
I struggled with the third drawing (the legs). The two feet remained on the same plain. Then Tony Tribe came to my rescue. He talked of 'context'. We had a productive discussion at this point. My history, well recorded by my blog, reveals that my drawings rarely include context. Ropes, supporting the model at 'extreme poses' , do not enter my thinking. Supporting chairs, plinths, cushions, etc, are rarely seen. I focus on the body. Tony referred to the floor, afterwhich I immediately connected with my architectural pre-life and suggested in the drawing the 'perspective' of the floor boards, then of course I saw the reflections in its shiny surface. Immediately, the way forward was clear and somehow I became compelled to bring out the charcoal and to energetically explore that which had attracted me at the beginning.
Finally, for me, the highlight experience, process and drawing of the day. The model sitting on a stool, upon a table. Me, a metre or so away, and sitting low at my easel. I could see her face peeping over her shoulder. And, I could also look down upon the underside of her foot, as it was upturned upon the struts of the stool. This drawing continues my 'anagram' process which I have described in previous postings.

Arts Alive Summer School: day 2

With Penny again, firstly standing for a 10 minute pose with hand resting on a clay male muscle maquette, providing a contrast in anatomy. She has her weight on her right leg with left leg stretched out at an angle so introducing an assymetry into her buttocks and a slight twist in the spine.
Secondly a really enjoyable time bringing together parts of Penny in a new spatial relationship. I like the accidental ambiguity in which I drew her right breast directly in relation to the right arm may also be interpreted as her left breast related to her left arm. I'm using fineliner pens to start with before I started on the tinted charcoal and finally some heavy 6B graphite pencil lines. She is sitting upon a high stool, her right hand on the seat and the foot I've included is resting on a cross bar between the legs of the stool.
Finally a type of drawing rare in my vocabulary these days: a kind of monochromatic portrait. It did not start as a portrait, as I was interested in the diagonal activity as she rested her upper tummy, rib cage and breast on her right thigh. The drawing progressed from this interest.

Arts Alive Summer School: day 1

At Tony Tribe's 5 day Summer School at Arts Alive in Crickhowell. This is day one with Penny, who I have been drawing for a number of years. I know her really well, and we are good friends. The dialogue between model and artist is well established. So, how can I build on this? How can I further enter into this rare relationship and respond in a deeper way, through my drawing? I did not ask myself this question, today, or even before today. But, it is a good question. And I will be addressing it this evening, and overnight, ready to make an unexpected step along my life-drawing journey over the remaining four days.
I say this because, upon reflection, I feel that today I remained within my comfort zone of a fairly well rehearsed process. The first two drawings strongly echo recent pieces. However, in the third drawing I detect in the composition, in the line expression, in the flow of forms, and most significantly in the degree of ambiguity in the upper content of the drawing, suggestions of how I may proceed tomorrow. If this suggests a plan, then I know I can be sure that something very different (to the plan) will emerge. I can't wait!

Bits of Liv

The previous posting is of my three drawings from the pose which our model Liv held throughout the day. To start with we had 10 or so one minute poses. I elected to select just one bit of Liv each time and to see what would happen, e.g. would they together result in an interesting overall composition. They didn't, and I don't really go along with others who seem to believe that these short poses have a value. I know what the benefits are suposed to be, its just that I prefer longer ones.

Another day, a different response.

This posting follows immediately from the previous one and the drawings could be seen to be a response to the frustration and doubt expressed. However they could simply be the result of a change in the multitude of variables which come into play to influence the artist's perception, attitude and reaction, from one venue and time to another. One major influence which suggested to me I could explore something different was the space available to move my easel across the studio, and back, a number of times, to bring together two views of the model. There was lots of space to do this in.
Another variable I was conscious of was that I was feeling really good within myself. So I believe I was in a very relaxed state, both mentally and physically. The drawings have a flow about them, a sort of 'freedom of expression'. And, Liv the model inspires. But I would add here that Liv inspires in specific ways, as do each of the models I regularly draw. They each have physical and personalty characteristics that stimulate a dialogue between artist and model. There is no barrier. It is a joy to share a process in which artist and model feel and acknowledge that both are contributing, and that both appreciate the other's role.

Perhaps a frustration and a doubt is creeping in?

July 7th at Extreme Poses and my five drawings from the five 30 minute poses. Now after about ten days have passed I return to photograph them and start up a reflection on where I am. My anagram approach continues with minor new variations on my developing themes. But looking back over recent postings I see a degree of repetition with occasional yet infrequent breakthrough highlights. I really do enjoy these when they happen. But I am also feeling, and I have commented on this previously, that my morphisms are so distorting the human body that I feel I am violating the beauty of the body before me, particularly when that violation is against the qualities of the female nude. I have discussed this with my artist friends and they tend to agree with each other that I should not be concerned about this, that my outcomes are not seen as distortions, that 'violation' is an inappropriate term to apply, and that what is taking place is a fascinating and very personal response.
I recall a conversation with Paul Fowler, the author of 'extreme poses', in which we highlighted a principal significance of placing the model in the suspended harness of straps and ropes was to challenge the perception of the human body by separating it from our usual 'gravity based' understandings and thereby setting up a process in the artists mind of 'deconstruction', of 'challenge', of 'exploring alternative ways of seeing'. This is what I have responded to and have evolved my own particular genre. So I guess there will be a continuity from what has gone before but I will be conscious of my doubts. (today I also photographed and reflected upon my three drawings from my latest day of life drawing. These will be included in my next posting, and I do believe I was already responding to the above, but of course the context was different, I.e. no ropes, different venue, different group of artists, different time, I probably felt very different on the day, etc.)

At 'Extreme Poses' on July 7th 2016

This is the last Thursday before the summer break, and here are my five drawings from the morning. Five 30 minute poses, drawn principally with two hands working together on A1 cartridge paper. I have yet to photograph them individually,  but will do this and post them in a few days time.
Over the summer I will be attending at (I) a full day at Brockweir in the Wye Valley on July 12th, (ii) a 5 day Summer School at Arts Alive in Crickhowell,  and (iii) Paul Fowler's 3 days of double model extreme poses in Stroud on August 10th to 12th.
After the break the following sessions start again, (I) Extreme Poses on September 1st, (ii) Monday evenings in Monmouth on September 12th, and (iii) Brockweir on September 20th.

A double dose of 'extreme poses'

Double in the sense of a morning and an afternoon, and two models. So, rather than the usual five 30 minute poses with a single model at Pegasus Art in Stroud, Paul Fowler set up an extended suspension system in the converted chapel that is now Prema Arts Centre at Uley in Gloucestershire.
We had 10 minute poses through to 30 minute poses, and I searched for opportunities to respond to that which is extra when two models pose together. So, the space in between them may be the issue, or it is the way that two bodies can become one that attracts.
Here are my drawings in the sequence produced. All are A1, and I start each one with my two-handed, two-graphite pencil mark-making method, with the additional use of Derwent tinted charcoal. This was a relaxed day in which my response to each pose was completely devoid of any preconceived plan. Upon reflection I feel that the variation within the drawings suggests I am developing  kind of 'vocabulary' from which I can select a response to any given challenge. If this is what is happening, then I must question this approach. If true, then I feel uneasy with this insight.