At Semester's End...

My honest opinion of this class is that it was challenging but great. It was fun and involving most of the time. It was a lot of work and I wish I had pushed myself harder in some areas. I'm not at a loss of good things to say about my teacher and my peers when I hear about other drawing classes. I wish I could of researched more about the artist we were given and wrote more in my sketchbook. Sometimes the class was boring and sometimes (I don't mean to offend) Jason talked too much about conté, but those times were few and far between. I believe that there should be more "Bring your own music" days, just a bit more, not too many. It reached my expectations, I felt like emphasis was placed on a lot of areas of drawing that were needed. I learned a lot about my strengths and my weaknesses. Landscape is one of my weaknesses, that's why I put an old one I did as the picture for this post. What else can I say about the class? I don't think that there are many things funner than getting to draw all day and learning and perfecting techniques. That in itself made it a good class regardless.

Sorry Jason, I actually forgot to put "Rework" on my last rework of the planar analysis of fabric. Here is the picture of that by the way.

About the Gestural Self-Portraits:

I felt quite excited to do this project, I usually feel like drawing the subject is more important than seeing the picture. It was exhilarating, liberating even, to draw recklessly! Likeness is not the goal, just let it flow and go the way it wants. Just let it all go and be. Sometimes I feel cheated when I draw, I feel lied to, it's the same when I see art. Not in a good way. These however, they don't lie. What is there is just something that happened. It's not even a reflection of the artist anymore, it's a reactionary contraction of lines. They were quite refreshing, let everything go. I just wish we did more than the contour in class; something more liken to these in class would of been interesting and fun as well. just a thought.

Awesome Gestural Work I like:
1st is by the great illustrator, Austin Briggs. His line is really great to me (it may not show in this picture) I encourage you to zoom in to full size and relish in all the details.


Some gesture of Bernie Fuchs in the studio I like.


Just some general gesturing from some random person I have. Very excited to loosen up, have never really gestured with objects before, but as long as I don't have to use the ruler anymore I am happy. Yes, I think this next week will be great. Not too sure about getting all the materials i am hoping I don't forget any (especially the sharpened stick). I hope everyone else is as excited as I am, I think we should get as crazy as allowed next week.

Last but not least, gesture of a Panda I did.

This was my set-up. This assignment was pretty fun, had trouble keeping the t-square clean and touching the still-life by accident.

I think the above picture pretty well describes the mood of the room that day. Oh well it could have been worse, somehow. Now is the best time to draw.

Thanks for the comment on that last post Jason; I hadn't fogotten but I do have some catching up to do.

Class is really fun to me; it's not extremely tedious and not completely unrestricting so far. The assignments are reasonable and fun, it's something I look forward to when I think about all my other work. I'm wondering if we can color in our sketchboooks; based on the examples, I'd say the answer is yes. I also want to drill myself on the cylindrical ellipses we drew in class the other day. Also, a 2-point with a very low horizon line may look interesting.

On to Examples;

The sequence is 3 point, 2 point, then 1 point. It was quite hard to find something that could depict 3 point. 1 point was the easiest. I added a sketch I did of Cole on the first day for fun. Reading the assignments in the syllabus gets me excited as well.

Ingres work and use of line is especially beautiful. The eye takes what it needs; but as artist I believe we can take what we want from reality and this is what he does here. The line is especially harsh and firm as it comes down her abdomen and further more as it comes down her right arm. How the line is slightly, delicately there as it draws the cushioning of her buttocks as well is a sign of ability.

Smith has a way of making minute lines work for him; not just in his shading but in the traces of the smallest lines on her face. It's effective and careful, calculating even how sharp the lines are.

Schiele has a fury of things working in his sketch; most prominently the wild curly dark lines that can be called hair. It swirls around her and is relatively uniform in thinkness and value. In the face however is where the real power can be seen. This is why I picked this particular piece of his. This sketch can show the distinction of the lines and their qualities but as one face, it still works.

I am very excited about drawing class. I have a lot of expectations. I want to really ground my skills in this subject in any way possible. I would say that I am disappointed that we will only be doing still life- but it initself is also quite an engaging subject. One that is barely touched on in the mass of things. Despite this I am willing and hoping to learn everything available.
During the exercise it was very difficult to hold my attention. I did my best to try and make compositions that would be interesting. Usually however I tried to use the line widths to my advantage. I want there to be a balance where there is not too many and not too few. From what I gathered at the first class there is more of an interest to experiment with the line-work we use and probably get used to drawing said lines. Perspective will be a more interesting subject I feel. Generally it is easy, but from what I hear about really learning perspective is that it is difficult and definitely beneficial. Shear confidence in the area and plain will make me draw better it seems. Well, so far I'm anticipating a good year.
I'm also excited that we can life draw in our sketchbooks; if only to drill ourselves on what we have learned in class.