Last night we had the last of the summer sessions. In the fall, the location, and also the monitor, will switch. Another local artist has now agreed to organize these very democratic sessions: no instructor, no lesson structure, just a model for 2.5 hours and a space to draw him or her.

Nice.

Gratitude.

So here below is a selection from the evening’s work. The model was Larissa (“do you know the road to Larissa?”). She’s a venusian, pear shaped woman: thin from the waist up and thick from the waist down. In both aspects rather exaggerated, so she has an interesting form – and she’s a good model (strikes interesting poses and keeps ’em).

We had our usual warm up poses – 6 @ 5 minutes, followed by 6 @ 15. I used carbon/charcoal pencils and a kneaded eraser on the smooth side of light brown 35 x 50 cm recycled paper. The carbon pencil makes a gray mark, while the charcoal is black and definitive. Generally, once I’ve made my decisions in carbon, I follow with charcoal.

I did not feel particularly successful as the evening wore one. I felt kinda “Meh”. In any case, I usually just focus on drawing, like practicing musical scales, then I look it all over the next day. I was surprised then, later, to see how much I had recorded (more or less correctly), how a few strokes of the charcoal pencil in the studio could bring out whatever a strong line I wanted to emphasize. Often that was all that was needed. Increasingly, I find myself less dependent upon the model in order to create a “realistic” figure drawing. For me, that’s a huge speed bump!

My focus: placement on the page, proportionality and gesture (conveyed by inner graphical constructs). Also, I’m learning how to suggest the volume of a bodily shape through simple well placed lines (in contrast to chiaroscuro). Note to self: commit to a line and avoid the chicken scratch.

Also, I was surprised to see how many drawings I had that were “keepers”. In the end, I had nine(!) – which is a pretty high batting average for me – and very encouraging. My consistency appears to be increasing.

That’s great!