More 10 minute poses from 04/02/10

These are four more quick 10 minute poses from last Thursday which initially I dismissed as not worth displaying. However, over the past few days I have come to acknowledge that they do hold certain characteristics in the way my drawing is developing. I like the marks made with the conte crayon; the transparency of the colour on the paper; the limited palette of colours in each one; and the contrast between the more subtle application of colour to the body in the top two as opposed to the more energetic application in the lower drawing.

Life Drawing 04/02/10 Nos2

These are my two drawings of the main morning and the main afternoon poses of this Thursday's life drawing class. Both are pastel on 'heavy' white paper, A1 in size.

With them I believe I am entering a stage in my life drawing journey which is beginning to make some progress with the issue of the relationship between colour and tone. I know this is a very complex subject but one which I feel there is a strategy emerging in my work for addressing it. But that is all I'm saying about it at the moment. This is a very good example for me of a path that is made by walking. Over the next few weeks the direction this path is taking will, I anticipate, become clearer (or more complex). In the meantime, I will add that I am really enjoying the way colour has entered my life.

Both these drawings are unfinished and represent what was produced within the time constraints of the session and have not been worked on or added to later, as are all the drawings so far posted on this blog.

Life Drawing 04/02/10 Nos1

I attend Thursday life drawing for three hours both morning and afternoon. We start each session with three 10 minute poses. The model again was Marcia as last Thursday.

I particularly like this pose and was very pleased with the drawing: it conveys an iconic image of the female form, and the technique of using a conte stick, both on its edge and drawing the stick across the paper, produces some interesting marks. For each of the six poses I selected three colours to deal with the tonal range with the paper itself providing the fourth 'highlight' tone. This drawing used blue (darkest tone) and purple and green. Another combination I explored was red, orange and yellow. The paper size is A3.

Life Drawing 02/02/10 Nos3

An evening session which lasted for two and a half hours with a new model, Michelle.

Firstly, one of three 10 minute warm-up drawings, followed by a fairly quick A1 charcoal response on cartridge paper, all to familiarise myself with the characteristics and personality of the new model. I then chose a close up study of the same reclining pose, in pastel on an A2 grey pastel paper, to explore the landscape of the human form with warm and cool colours.

This completed a first for me: eight and a half hours of life drawing in one day. I shall not be doing this very often. However the satisfaction I felt from my achievements masked my exhaustion.

Life Drawing 02/02/10 Nos2

Three A3 warm-up 10 minute studies of Sue, using pastel and conte crayon, prior to the longer pieces in 02/02/10 Nos 1, and looking at ways of conveying the strong directional lighting on the model.

Life Drawing 02/02/10 Nos1

These are two drawings of Sue. The first was started last week at my Tuesday all-day life drawing class and completed on February 2nd. So in all I spent about 4 hours on it which is probably the longest I have spent on any one drawing. I used HB, 2B and 6B pencils on A1 cartridge paper. The process and technique contrasts to my usual more recent quick and energetic pastel or charcoal work. One of the issues was 'perspective' which I then addressed from viewing the same pose from the feet end. This A2 pastel drawing took about an hour. Here I was able to concentrate on the legs and feet as they came towards me: how big to make the left foot; the forshortening of the left leg; and the dominance of the right leg and knee. Fortunately the head was hidden from my view.

Life Drawing 28/01/10 Nos1

The model is Marcia, who I am drawing for the first time.

The first drawing is somewhat hesitant. However, the overall outcome of these three 10 minute gesture drawings at the start of the day came as something of a surprise to me. I do like the second and third.

In the second and third drawings the use of the green conte crayon as a tone which is darker than the paper tone, together with the bright soft pastel announcing the highlights, and the red working with the green to emphasise the darkest tone or deep shadow areas, I believe works well. The A3 paper is light grey with a slight texture.