Drawing Very Still Life

You know what's neat? Drawing at the museums is neat. The dioramas are full of "exotic" life that you may never get the chance to see in the wild. Granted, and sadly, they are stuffed but the animals don't move and you aren't knee deep in tick infested grasses or tangled in poison oak. Depending on the display, you may move around the animal to find the angle that works best for your drawing. And best of all, you are not likely to be eaten.

Page Museum - Los Angeles, CA

I reluctantly use photographs for references, so it is nice to draw from real-time observational opportunities. I also like to draw fossils and the natural science museums generally have a collection on display.

Page Museum - Los Angeles

And speaking about birds - they really don't hold still or the most interesting ones are inevitably at the top of a sycamore tree. I don't know about your eyesight but mine just can't see tiny birds in big trees very well. Of course, I pulled a fast one on the birds that fly around my patio, I started feeding them and that gave me a chance to do quick gesture drawings (and sweep up the seed mess they make). I had quite a collection of house finches and sparrows that began to blossom out into goldfinches, doves, the world's biggest pigeons, and finally - red-tailed hawks who came to feast on the squirrels that ate my collection of succulents and pounds of peanuts. All of this wildlife on a 10ft. x 10ft. enclosed patio.

Scratchboard

My emphasis in college was in printmaking - lithography being my favorite medium. I also liked woodcut printing, although I didn't have the patience to do multiple colour blocks. It all comes back to drawing, I guess. Recently, I had the pleasure of a new drawing experience that produces a result similar to woodcut, except that it's not for multiple prints.

At a show hosted by the Pomona Valley Art Association, one of my pieces received the Ampersand Sponsors Award which was a sample of the boards that they make for painting, pastels and scratchboard. I quickly got caught up with the scratchboard, it offered the biggest challenges.

I have taught students how to use scratch techniques on ink covered foil and paper but this board was a new animal. I researched ready-made tools, and made my own tools. I looked at techniques used by other artists and found that the works I admired the most were constructed through happy accidents, unexpected tools, and some very creative problem solving. So, I took a shot at it and I think my first attempt came out pretty decent.  

What I especially like about this medium are the textures that I can create as I carve away at the inked surface. Most pencil techniques work well, as well as cross-hatching, but they have a "3-D" quality to them that adds it's own depth to the work. I took my time with the drawing and the completed work was over 50 hours of labor (I'm a process person!), the board is 11"x14" and is pre-inked. Ampersand makes a clayboard for scratching that allows you to start off white and add your own black ink in smaller areas. I like working from black to white, managing the value changes can be a difficult task but if I mess it up, the surface can be "repaired" with black India ink and redone.

Head Studies

The Chaffey Community Museum of Art hosts a modeling session, once a month, for painters to tweak their painting skills doing head studies. It is only about 3 hours of actual work time, and I'm just too slow at painting SO I bring my papers, pencils, charcoal, and stuff to play around with.

My first inclination is to begin with a gesture drawing, I like the energy, and the excitement of doing the drawing but at these sessions, I have been fighting the urge and trying to work more "academically" and take a structured approach to the drawing. I've been stretching out my time to the full three hours and I have found some benefit to that.

For one thing, I take more time with observing the model. I'm not just looking for the character of the sitter but the characteristics that build that particular head in such a way that the person can be seen as an "individual". Unfortunately, all but one of the models has been so similar in features that this is also becoming an exercise in boredom.

The models have been pointy nosed, with cheekbones sharp enough to shred paper, narrow upper lip and moderate lower lip. Now a change in the poses could remedy the situation but they all seem to sit up straight and stare ahead. Oh, well. I should just find my own models and stop complaining.

Look at the accompanying Page to see what I have been up to.

Therese