"Although making accurate descriptive drawings need not be the ultimate goal, learning to see size, shape, and space relationships and developing the discipline and control to translate convincingly what is seen onto a sheet of paper, provide a basic and essential vocabulary for the artist."Mendelowitz's Guide to Drawing, p. 12
The example given is a line-only sketch of Matisse's, entitled Acrobat. It completely conveys the person, but also conveys more than that.
This describes the elusive thing I have been searching for in drawing. My rendering skills are improving, but they tend to fall "flat". There isn't alot of expression in them, they don't convey that "point of view" that I quoted last time. So, while I hope to improve my rendering skills in the coming year, I also, very much hope to improve the expression that I make in drawing.
One of the exercises in the above book was to draw a chair (I chose a stapler) from many perspectives, using the pencil-at-arm's-length to get angles and sizes. Part of the idea was to see how many different shapes one object can take, depending on your perspective. I struggled against outlining the whole stapler - I tried to follow the values that I saw, instead of relying on a strong outline. I was running out of time (and growing tired of staring at a stapler), but I found that I was at a total loss as to how to convey the different textures on the stapler. In some of the sketches, it looks almost like it's made out of corduroy cloth! I just couldn't settle down enough to spend time refining it to show the curved edges. All in all, one of those thought-provoking exercises.
1 comment:
Interesting, I have been sketching the Hunt items, but haven't posted this Hunt. We had to draw the bottom of something and I picked up the stapler and drew it. :) It is not easy. You will see it when I post them in a day or so. I'm avoiding spending so much time in the forum.
You did well on this. Really.
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