After Sargent: Wind in the Willows Author

After Sargent, Kenneth Grahame
watercolor on paper

Bedtime stories. That's how it began apparently. Kenneth Grahame told his 4 year old son Alistair stories about a toad at bed time.

Grahame was a gifted individual that could have had success in many areas and certainly had it in some. He was successful in his career at the Bank of England. He published several stories, although none were as popular as his book The Wind in the Willows.

The rest of his life is fairly sad. His son Alistair struggled. His marriage apparently was not all that happy. But his memorable characters and their stories live on, bringing joy to children and adults.

More information can be found at the Kenneth Grahame Society website, where I gathered this brief look.

This watercolor is a copy of a drawing by John Singer Sargent.

After Sargent: Eugenia Errazuriz

This is another Sargent copy. Here is the version I did in 2007.

The great thing about doing these portraits in watercolor is that I can't really fix things that go awry. That gives me a fair amount of motivation to be diligent and have the shape I need to place in mind before putting brush to paper. At this point, my skill is inconsistent. But I hope as I continue, I will be right more often then not.

This is also a really fun way to play around with watercolor try out ideas and learn the medium.

After Sargent Flora Priestly

Flora Priestly, after Sargent.

I do know that I did a very bad version of this back in 2007 - I have it in the sketchbook. But, apparently I never posted it. Trust me, this one isn't great, but it's better.

These portraits provide a good challenge:

• getting the shapes right the first time, no drawing
• practice fixing the shapes when they are wrong the first time
• practice controlling hard and soft edges

After Sargent Gordon Greenough

I'm working my way, for a second time, through Sargent's portrait drawings.

Here's the version I did early back in 2007.

After Sargent in Watercolor

I think I may have started a new project for myself. Last night I flipped through a book of Sargent's portrait drawings. It's the book that I began with when I began blogging over six years ago.

This time I plan to paint my way through with watercolors - no drawing, just heading directly in with paint. Above is after Sargent's Paul Helleu. I don't think I drew him last time, as I can't find the post.

Portrait WIP

Here's a portrait I began this afternoon. It's from a reference photo on WetCanvas. There's more work to do but I thought I'd show the beginning anyway. Today was one of those tough days and by the time nap time rolled around I was ready for something comforting. A pencil portrait from a reference photo definitely feels comforting to me - thank you John Singer Sargent!

Enough chatter, off to finish my scarved lady.

The Right Look

This sketch is after Sargent's charcoal sketch of Sir William Blake Richmond. As Sargent drew him, he's looking at you with a bit of an attitude, I think that came across in my translation. I'm quite pleased with it.

I counted up today and I've done 21 of the portraits in my Sargent book, half of them. I would like to finish off this project as I said before with a portrait of my own. To that I will shortly be turning my attention. My husband is going in for surgery in a few days, so I may not finish by the end of January, but we'll see.

Back Again...

Last night we got a "loaner" from the "superstore," so I am back in business! Here are a few sketches from the last few days. I was unhappy with the first one (Benson, the man) when I finished it, but with an interval of some sleep, I think that the eyes have more expression then I thought they did. Sargent's Mrs. Webber is a melancholy beauty. In fact, it wasn't until I was working the lips in detail that I realized her mouth was open, about to break into a smile. But the weight (through values) that he gives to the eyes totally overwhelms the mouth. My version looks like a younger version of Sargent's lady.

I didn't get a portrait in on Saturday. I hope to do one this week sometime. I'd love to finish my Sargent project with a portrait of one or some of my boys. I just have to scrounge up some photos. My goal would be to keep two main things in mind that I have learned this month. First, what I have referred to in the past as his "economy of line." Second, his famous use of light and dark. We'll see...

Two More...

The lady is Dame Ethel Smyth, apparently a good friend of Sargent's. He drew her singing at the piano. The man is W.B. Yeats. Yeats was 40 at the time Sargent drew him, but Sargent's drawing makes him look much younger. He told Sargent that he wore his hair flopped over and a big tie to remind him of his significance as an artist. Personally, I have to believe Sargent *made* him look young, arrogant, and stupid because of that. Certainly one has to think that the dark shadows over the eyes were meant to speak "mysterious" to Yeats and "without light" to the rest of us.

Fashion and Economy

One interesting thing about looking at portraits of another century...there are things that don't make sense. For instance, looking at Sargent's drawing of this woman I can tell that she has an elaborate hat on. However, I could barely begin to tell you what is hair and what is hat. I cropped this picture close to the head for just that reason. Rarely does 21st century fashion make sense to me, I can't pretend I will ever understand this sort of thing.

And for the economy, I just have to say again how looking intensely at JSS's drawings I see a few small, precise lines that make great suggestions as to features and the like. Less is definitely more in the works that I have looked at. To give you an idea, this portrait, which is small, and is based on another's work, only took around 15 minutes from start to finish.

Back to Sargent

(Again, forgive the glare.) I've been dreading this portrait since I decided to work through this book. There is so much about it that shrieks "tricky" to me and not being particularly artistically clever, I felt doomed to failure.

In the original, she is looking rather askance at the viewer, from a slight elevation. She also looks rather regal in her attire. I have made her looking off in the middle distance, wrapped up in blankets with her chin tucked in. But, I didn't entirely fail, I did a better job with the values this time and if you just look at the eyes, the eyebrows look like she genuinely pulled them back. (When I first saw Sargent's drawing I wondered at how he could make the shadows on the eyelids darker and larger than the eyebrows and have it work.)

Enough said on that, I'm going to try and squeeze in another drawing for today!

That sculpting idea...

As I said yesterday, this is the first of the more 'painterly-style' portraits that I have attempted. Sargent's work was done in charcoal, his lights are lighter and his darks are darker than mine. Of all the works that I've done here this is the least like the original. I've got the guy looking out, whereas Sargent's looks down. Also, the mood of mine is much different, Sargent's is more somber and contemplative. Part of this is due to the fact that I have some of the values wrong, there is more of the darkest darks on his face and hair than I have put in (to match the darks in the eyes).

That said though, I am pleased that this came out as much as it did. Because it is a tonal work, I can't just transcribe lines. I actually had to try more of the sculpting idea that Sargent and others mention. So, I began just shading in large areas on the paper, I had a few guidelines, but not more than a circle for the head and an 'X' for the line of the nose and placement of the eyes. Then began refining the shading in of tones to more and more exact shapes, as a sculptor would chip away at his rock revealing the shape within slowly.

This was an exciting way to work. I have tried it before, but it has been a while. I even had a sort of minute where all of a sudden I stopped and looked and thought, "that's it, it has transformed from blotches to a figure." Honestly, I tried to refine it a bit after that and realized quickly that I best stop, because I was on the verge of screwing it up!

Tomorrow, time permitting, I will attempt a portrait from a photo I've got.

Last of the 'Drawn' Portraits

Two sketches today because yesterday my drawing time was spent in a traffic snarl resulting from a four car accident. Things like that always make me thankful to arrive home, even when late.

Anyway, this post represents the last two of the more "drawing-style" portraits in the book I am working through. Sargent's next thirty or so are in more of a painterly-style. He also did the rest in charcoal as opposed to pencil. They should be quite a challenge for me. I hope to stay with pencil myself as I work through them - with 3 little boys around I need a more "drop-at-a-moment-and-dash-to-the-disaster" kind of medium than charcoal, we'll see.

As for these two, there are a few points of interest. The first is a man with predominantly white or graying hairs on an equally light background. My first instinct would be to throw in a dark background to reveal him, but I assume that would have changed the mood to something Sargent didn't want. His sparing use of line creates the illusion of all that bushy white hair even on the light background. (NB. The lips are suggested with two blotches of darkness! Sargent is a master!)

Secondly, on the Duchess of Marlborough portrait I'm going to make a wild conjecture. He saw her turn at this angle and fell in love with the line of her face and neck. As you look at his work, the line down the side of her face and her neckline on the same side are two bold, confident strokes. There is evidence (in his drawing) of work around her left eye for the right shape, but the rest of it is very plain vanilla tonal work and outline to get the basics. So, I'm guessing that the edge of her face and neck entranced him. (On other work I have dashed to capture a specific line or edge I see that grabs my interest and then found that the rest of the object I just didn't care about.)

That's the offering for today...

Greenough Portrait

Today I started my blog, but I started drawing on the 1st, so I have a little backlog. This is the second one that I did. Sargent did his about six years after the Beckwith portrait on my first post. This was more challenging simply because Sargent had developed quite a bit as an artist between this portrait and the last one that I did.

Sargent in January

I am beginning this blog to push myself (a little bit). I've been a lurker on other blogs for a while. Some of them are spending time this January learning from John Singer Sargent. I've decided to join them and learn from my betters. The real artists participating in this project are: Katherine Tyrrell and Maggie Stiefvater.

I am working my way through Dover's Publication of his portrait drawings. Above is my version from the first page. Sargent did it in his first year of formal training. When I was doing this, I was impressed with his "economy of line." In several places Sargent only used one line to suggest a feature (e.g. the lower lip), but the subtlety of that line produces the detail/likeness for which Sargent is renown. I have found the same to be true in other portraits as I have continued through the book. Katherine makes a similar point more vividly in reference to an oil painting here.

This blog will be rather minimalist - any blogging time must come from my "drawing time." So bear with me, but I hope to continue posting my sketches each day.