Drawing from Memory
The visual language session began with a 'drawing from memory' exercise, where I studied an image for as long as I needed to before then capturing as much information as I could, in multiple sittings, each time adding another element.
• For my first image, I wanted to focus solely on the female figure as an outline; recreating her pose looking to the left of the canvas and incorporating memorised elements such as her half-closed eyes, her beauty marks on her cheek and close to the eye, her pulled-back hair, diamond chandelier earring and ruffled blouse. A very minimalistic approach was undertaken to ensure I remembered as much of the central character as possible. I really like the simplicity of this illustration as find it to be the most accurate in regards to how the female model looks.
• In my second attempt, I focused more on the tonal values within the photograph; identifying and memorising, as accurately as I could, the light values of the main character - as well as adding in more of the background scenery and secondary characters. I think I got the lighting more accurate in this illustration, rather than the proceeding one, remembering roughly where the light hits on the female's face. The background wasn't entirely accurate though, nor was the shape and form of the earring or the lighting of the middle female character - so I decided to have one more study.
• Finally, I worked to rectify any mistakes I may have made in my first two attempts while adding in more accurate background information. I still didn't manage to get the lighting right on the female character, but the background was a lot more exact to the source material. I got her eyes more realistic to the original, as they were half-closed rather than completely closed, and added shoulders to her blouse. Even though more detail was added, this attempt is actually my least favourite from the exercise as the model's face is too roundish, her neck is too long, curved and thin and the tonal range is still not completely true.
To reflect: while the memory images had a more illustrative and personalised approach to them, I do also favour my illustration created while using the original image as reference in the final exercise. I tried to deviate from the source material and not just create a realistic response to everything. Some of the creativity and uniqueness was lost, however, in order for it to be more true to the source material.
Observational Drawing
Contrasting from the morning's session, I now drew observationally from still-life; a plant I had purchased and brought in for my studies. This provided much more of a challenge to me as a severely sight-impaired illustrator - so I tried to adapt as best as I could with having the plant as close to me as possible, touching it beforehand to understand the texture and taking my time to perceive the information I could manage.
• I began the observational drawing of my chosen plant by drawing the shapes of the leaves and budding flowers before then filling with black ink to finally show a silhouette. I wanted to start with this perspective so that I could better understand the individual flowers and leaves and how they connect with each other to form the whole object. While time-consuming, I considered this approach a success and my tutor gave me such positive feedback; even advising the rest of the studio to do the same technique!
• Now that I had spent a good amount of time understanding how the plant looked and felt, this time I applied the opposite outlook by creating a negative image. I also rotated my paper to portrait orientation to make better use of the space provided. Personally, I much prefer the silhouetted version as I was able to portray more of the visual information and I think the landscape orientation worked better - especially as the plant itself was more wide than tall.
• After focusing on basic shapes, I now wanted to spend time capturing more detail. I brought my plant even closer to me so I could study the front few leaves and get an idea of the patterns. This, of course, changed the perspective slightly so I tried to give the impression of closeness and a more 'above' viewpoint. I tapped in ink with a stippling affect to capture the essence of the natural, speckled structure on the leaves. Inspired by my peers close-by, I filled up my paper as much as possible this time. I really like the looser application I experimented with.
• In my final observational drawing for the day, I took a step back and wanted to portray the entirety of the plant again; this time conveying information with ink and a dip pen with interchangeable nibs (rather than using bushes as with my previous 3 pieces) using varying visual language of dashes, lines and cross-hatches. I really like the more realistic rendering here, reminding me of early etching or dry-point works seen in older children's books. If I had more time, I would have liked to have used my other different nibs to see which effects I could achieve.
Peer Crit
• I really favour the first plant for its loose approach, experimentation with tonal value and mixture of large brush strokes married with thin, finer lines for the simplified outlines of the leaves. This isn't a style I would normally choose or adopt myself, but seeing it applied to this plant makes me want to explore work using this kind of aesthetic. It works particularly well in providing expressive movement; making the plant look like a living, moving organism rather than something that it compact and static.
• The second plant grabbed my attention immediately due to how the illustrator had used the maximum amount of space possible on their paper. Another attention-grabbing element of this piece was the use of a large, textured brush used in such a way that played with the idea of highlights and lowlights; the softness of the brush helping to provide contour and automatic shaded gradients into light and dark. I would like to experiment with brushes more, as the only brushes I own myself are small, rounded watercolour ones devoid of texture - so I wasn't able to achieve this in my own work. this is most certainly something I will be adopting myself for future experimentation work.
• Finally, the third plant stood out to me, again, for the large brush strokes; but this time because of how they were applied with more ink, giving a much more dramatic look than the previous, softer perspective in plant number 2. Rather than this drawing showing just the silhouette, some highlights have been left in on the edges of the leaves and in the centre of the pot. This gives much more visual interest and I especially like the 'blocky' patterns on the plant pot itself mixed in with sweeping brush strokes portraying contours.
Reflection
The observational drawing session was very beneficial, and contrasted nicely with drawing from memory. Here, I was forced to draw what was in front of me, considering the shape and form and how I was going to translate that onto paper. David Hockney himself has always favoured observational drawing; seeing things from life that you couldn't necessarily see, or capture, from a photograph. In my case, observational drawing is a massive challenge as a lens, such as a camera's, captures images much better than my own eye lens - which is weak and can only focus centrally in one eye (with no peripheral vision). This results in my observations taking much longer than my sighted peers and the need for me to study the simplistic shapes first - as seen in my first, silhouetted piece, before trying other approaches in order for me to understand how the object functions and interlocks. My 8% vision is a massive drawback in observational drawing, but it is something I continually challenge myself with so I can improve and force myself to 'see' - even if things aren't as detailed or as true to life as they could be. It is a time-consuming process, but one that I enjoy as much as I can in my capacity.
No comments:
Post a Comment