How to draw... #2.1

Ok sorry, I wrote Rule 2 in a jiffy. But I'm not saying it's not true.

For me toning doesn't come naturally and I have been criticised before. But that's because my origins weren't from realism. My first love was Cubism. So my early attention to light and shadow was limited if not any at all. My priority was form, texture and colour. It was only when I began to slide from the abstract, the whimsy of visual art to the delicate still life I faced my first challenge. I was once criticised for my preliminary canvas painting of orchards during a painting studio. I was told to look where the light was coming from and where the resulting shadow would be and try again. You see, although it was a still life, the flowers were real and I drew them from life but the entire canvas composition was entirely made up and so must the lighting. Subsequently, the next day, I painted over the entire canvas with a selection of whites and brown in contrast to the prior vibrant but flat pinks and reds. I'll show her! When the tutor came round again, though she was pleased with the improvement, she seemed rather astound at my abrupt turn around. I guess she didn't think I'd repaint the entire canvas.

Now days, it's a whole new approach. It's portraiture in graphite. The pro is that it's a medium that is simple to use - we've been using pencil since we were toddlers - and it's easy to correct mistakes. The challenge is more detail is required to achieve the realistic effect so more patience and care.

How to daw... #2

Ok where was I?

Rule 2: Light, shadow, tone.

No screw the lot. I still suck at these. My advice choose a point of light source and practice. If realism isn't you're thing then it doesn't matter anyway. But if realism is your thing you're most likely using a reference picture or drawing from life so back to Rule 1.

How to draw...

I'm procrastinating.

There are so many YouTube clips that claim to show you how to draw something realistically but really it's not the how but simply watch me draw.

So I thought I'd write about something a little different. I'm not claiming you will learn how to draw from reading this but maybe find your own approach to learning this skill if you so wish.

Rule 1: What you see, not what you think it looks like.

I've always believed that everyone has the ability to draw - If you can write. You can draw. Writing in itself is like drawing. Letters are symbols after all, and symbols stem from pictures. I had a friend in high school - well I also knew her in primary school - she chuckled at this belief. She'd claimed many times that she could not draw and based on her outputs it's hard to argue against her. But put it to a simple test and I soon realised it was not that she couldn't draw it was more she didn't try. Her overwhelming belief that she could not, paralyzed any effort.

Have you ever participated in a simple realistic drawing exercise where four people sit around a table with a still life arrangement placed in the centre? Each individual attempts to draw the objects as they are sitting in front of them for just a few minutes. The participants are then instructed to rotate seats and move around the table but leave the drawing they were working on for the next person taking their seat; and so each individual will have to continue the work of their predecessor and draw the objects from each of the 4 perspectives.

I remember doing this activity with a glass mug and an interesting-looking hammer. I started my drawing, paying attention to the shape of the forms I could see from where I was sitting and transferring it onto the page. Moments later I then moved to the seat next to me where this friend had sat as instructed. And to this day I can still visualise the sketch I saw all those years ago as I looked down at her drawing. It was a sketch of the still life sitting in front of me - yes. But it resembled an abstract drawing as if she had only read a description of the composition and promptly attempted to depict it rather than drawing what she could see in front of her. The oval shape I saw as the rim of the mug was depicted as a full fledged circle and drawn physically larger than the body of the rest of the mug. The mug handle put simply as a double C and the hammer... well, remember how I mentioned it was unusual-looking, she had replaced the hammer head with a plain regular one. I realised that she had not tried to look at what she could see. Instead she succumbed to her belief and drew haphazardly of what she knew of the shapes.

Ask yourself, what do you actually see?

****To be continued... stay tuned.

Because I love sleep...

I love sleep. I love it above so many and possibly all other things in life. Unfortunately I just come off as a sloth to my peers. They just don't get it.

Russell Foster: Why do we sleep?