Sunday 28 February 2010




Reading:



Daniel M. Mendelowitz and Duane Wakeham A Guide to Drawing (Fifth Edition)

Harcourt Brace Jovanovich College Publishers, Orlando, Florida, USA, 1995

Pp 240-285



Personal Sketchbook work: A diagrammatic drawing of the intra-cardiac procedure for which I’m scheduled tomorrow, which I hope will let me resume full effort soon.

Total time: 54 minutes

Tuesday 23 February 2010




Persistent cardiac problems prevented much work today



Personal Sketchbook work: A sketch of a doctor’s examining table in my pocket sketchbook. A sketch of a small still life, more conventional than I’ve been working on, done with Design Ebony pencil in my A4 sketchbook.

Total time: 47 minutes

Monday 22 February 2010




Course work: A skull with reed pen, steel pen, and brush. A fairly interesting approach, if I can think of a good way to integrate it with other natural objects done in other media.

A second skull, very loosely done with powdered graphite and a bristle brush: won’t work for this application.

Reading:



Jeffery Camp Draw: How to Master the Art

Dorling Kindersley, London, 1993

Pp 35-51



Total time: 1 hour 21 min

Sunday 21 February 2010




Course work: Tried a new arrangement for a still life, consisting of a box-tortoise shell, a pear, a sweet-gum ball, and a volcanic rock. This was initially done in graphite, then worked over with markers. Don’t like this one, either.

Reading:



Daniel M. Mendelowitz and Duane Wakeham A Guide to Drawing (Fifth Edition)

Harcourt Brace Jovanovich College Publishers, Orlando, Florida, USA, 1995

Pp 205-239



Bert Dodson Keys to Drawing With Imagination

North light Books, Cincinnati, Ohio, USA, 2007

Pp 30-57



Weekly reflections on learning experience: Not my best week. Profound indecision about the final Assignment Three drawing, coupled with anxiety about persisting cardiac problems, has left me feeling that I have done very little of merit, especially over the past five days. I’ll keep on trying.



Total time: 1 hour 10 minutes



Monday 22 February 2010

Friday 19 February 2010




(Cardiac problems have kept me from doing nearly as much work as planned for the past three days.)



Reading:



Bert Dodson Keys to Drawing With Imagination

North light Books, Cincinnati, Ohio, USA, 2007

Pp 6-29



Personal Sketchbook work: In my pocket sketchbook, a partial sketch of a fat man dozing in a doctor’s waiting room.

Retrospective review: Six months ago today I started work on Start Drawing. A review of my coursework and the work in my personal sketchbooks shows substantial improvement in quality over the period. I have learned at least something about the use of media that I had not previously considered using, e.g., markers, and have worked in areas in which I had little previous experience, e.g., portraits. I look forward to starting the Landscape section soon. I wish that I had known about OCA when I retired, so that I could have started working on the courses then, with some reasonable expectation of finishing the entire program.



Total time: 38 minutes

Thursday 18 February 2010




Course work: Work continues on selection of objects for the still life. I did a graphite drawing of a large conch shell (probably not to be included: the texture is interesting, but the color is much the same as the skull…too much white!). I then did a drawing of a dark volcanic stone with graphite, marker, and pastel: this has enough texture to consider inclusion. A third drawing was of a small oak gall, which also has enough texture and size difference from other objects to be worth considering. I need to get more color in, and this may prove a challenge in mid-winter.

Reading:



Daniel M. Mendelowitz and Duane Wakeham A Guide to Drawing (Fifth Edition)

Harcourt Brace Jovanovich College Publishers, Orlando, Florida, USA, 1995

Pp 173-204



Total time: 1 hour 6 minutes

Wednesday 17 February 2010




Course work: Another developmental drawing on 12 x 18” (305 x 457mm) paper, using pen and markers. Substitution of a larger manikin is interesting; replacement of the rounded clay pot with a square plastic one is less successful. My intent had been to introduce some variety in shape, but now I have ended up with my major items all smooth in texture. In this larger format, I’m also less pleased with the look of marker and pen together. More thinking to be done.

Total time: 1 hour 3 minutes

Tuesday 16 February 2010




Course work: Two more rough sketches using mixed media, one with pen and marker in which the color was rather loosely applied and the pen lines then drawn over it; the other incorporated pen, marker, and soft pastel. I think the half-page in my A4 sketchbook was too small to do the former justice, and plan to test it on a larger format. The latter makes depiction of rough and smooth surfaces easier, and it also merits a larger-scale test. I am beginning to have a clearer idea of what objects I want to include in my still-life setup, and will add and subtract them in further preliminary studies until I am reasonably content with it.

Reading:



Gemma Guasch and Josep Asunción Form

Barron’s Educational Series, Inc, Hauppage, New York, USA, 2004

Pp 134-159 (I did not think this book was quite up to the standard of Line by the same authors; the focus was quite vague, and some of the examples utilized seemed inappropriate or irrelevant. The text was fairly superficial, and the “meat” of the book lies in the sequential “work in progress” illustrations.)



Personal Sketchbook work: A pencil and marker drawing of a cat’s eye view of part of the living room. Patterns and colors were changed somewhat to compensate for limitations in my marker assortment, but I believe the cat would recognize the view.

Other activity: My painting group met today (time not included).



Total time: 2 hours 18 minutes (149h12m)

Monday 15 February 2010




Course work: Continued testing media combinations. Today tested water-soluble felt-tip pen with water-soluble colored pencil, dip pen with soft pastel, and (on a scrap of water-color paper) marker with oil pastel, lightly brushed over with solvent.

Reading:



Gemma Guasch and Josep Asunción Form

Barron’s Educational Series, Inc, Hauppage, New York, USA, 2004

Pp 40-133



Personal Sketchbook work: A small paper wasp nest. These are made from wood pulp produced by the wasps, and are typically varying shades of grey with some streaks of tan, depending on the source of the wood. The cells tend toward the hexagonal, but are much less regular in shape and size than are honeycomb cells, especially in a nest this small, which appears to have been overtaken by winter before any larvae were produced. A large nest may be 15 cm across, and have more than one level.

Total time: 2 hours 29 minutes

Sunday 14 February 2010




Course work: Commenced the initial work for the final Assignment Three drawing. In order to test media pairs, I quickly sketched four small still lifes including four very different objects: a plant, a lemon, a human skull, and a small painter’s manikin. I made no attempt at accurately depicting shape, only general form. I then used marker and colored pencil, ink and brush plus colored pencil, pen plus marker, and graphite pencil and sanguine chalk. The pen and marker, and the marker and colored pencil, show the most promise from this set. The combination of graphite and sanguine chalk allows some interesting effects, but I think it highly unlikely to be acceptable for this part of the assignment…it would have been useful in Assignment Two. I plan to do several more of these media combinations before narrowing my choices and trying some more leisurely studies.

Reading:



Michiel Plomp Rembrandt and His Circle: Drawings and Prints

The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 2006

Pp 2-48 (A monograph work on Rembrandt, his students, and his followers, and the difficulty often encountered in separating their works.)



Personal Sketchbook work: A colored pencil sketch of the head of our orange tabby.

Weekly reflections on learning experience: A good week, with a feeling of accomplishment. Not having tried to draw fish since some of my zoology courses (50 yours ago!) I’m fairly pleased with my results. Other work went reasonably well, too.



Total time: 2 hours 12 minutes

Saturday 13 February 2010




Course work: Applied several more layers and details to the catfish on a plate drawing, with water-soluble crayon. Applied a few small details with water-soluble pencil. During the drying intervals on the first drawing, I started work on the second. Since no medium was specified for this drawing, I chose to use markers (perhaps my least favorite medium), and 11 x 14” (279 x 356mm) marker paper. I used a lighter set of tones on this drawing, and some initial and unsuccessful experimentation showed me that I should omit the subtle greenish tint. Nevertheless, it looks reasonably like a catfish; in fact, I prefer it to my first drawing.

Personal Sketchbook work: In my pocket sketchbook, I attempted a sketch of a snow-covered pine branch (a rare sight here). First, I blacked the page with a graphite pencil and tried lifting out the light parts with an eraser…this was not satisfactory. Then I tried white and very light blue colored pencil in the erased areas…this was not successful either. Then I dabbed white acrylic paint over the erased areas with a cotton-tipped swab…this was somewhat better, but still not satisfactory. The next step was to brush over the darker areas with black ink, and finally to add a bit more light blue colored pencil. What started as a quick sketch ended up as a multimedia exercise, still not entirely successful, but certainly a learning experience.

Drawing animals check and log: The most difficult part of the animal drawing exercises was getting the animals to stay still long enough to get something onto the paper. In a few cases (the wild animal drawings) I was forced to use photographs simply because of availability. I found the memory of my long-ago classes in comparative anatomy helpful with these exercises.



I still enjoy graphite pencil for drawing. Reasons include (1) familiarity, (2)easy correctability, (3) easy portability, (4) ability to depict a wide range of tones, (5) no cleanup required, (6) no unpleasant odors.



Zoos are reasonably good places to draw animals (in the past, I’ve drawn in two zoos). Difficulties include raging hordes of uncontrolled children, intrusive adults, and of course animals that insist on remaining out of sight. Farms are another good place to draw animals, though the variety is more limited. As I’ve noted before, drawing wild animals is pretty much a matter of chance, and a camera with a reasonable telephoto lens is essential.



Total time: 1 hour 58 min (142h13m)

12 February 2010




Course work: Fish are sluggish this time of year, but occasionally one finds a hungry one. A catfish having thus inadvertently volunteered to serve as my model, I started with four pencil sketches to familiarize myself with morphology and to provisionally select a pose. I followed this up with a color study done in water-soluble crayon, and was able to identify some problem areas, notably getting the reflection on the back to look right. (Catfish lack scales, so that they appear very smooth and shiny. Color varies widely, but is typically a slightly greenish black to black with a dirty grey-green to grey underside. Fins are usually dark, occasionally brownish, and the rays are not particularly prominent. The dorsal and pectoral fins each contain a sharp spine, as many a fisherman has learned to his sorrow.) Not having a source for the Bockingford paper suggested in the text, I substituted a quarter-sheet of Arches 300gsm cold-pressed paper, which is approximately A3 in size, did my light pencil sketch, and applied the first layer of Caran D’Ache Neocolor water-soluble crayon.

Reading:



Gemma Guasch and Josep Asunción Form

Barron’s Educational Series, Inc, Hauppage, New York, USA, 2004

Pp 7-39



Personal Sketchbook work: A sketch of my heavy work coat, really needed this afternoon as we had our first measurable snow of this century, about 10 cm.

Total time: 2 hours 20 min

Thursday 11 February 2010




Course work: Completed work on the king-snake drawing today. The snake looks more like a snake than the hand does a hand, but I’m not too displeased.

Reading:

Hajo Düchting Cézanne

Taschen, Köln, 1989

Pp 170-216

(A beautifully-produced book with many high-quality reproductions. I found the text somewhat difficult: the author is more convinced of his ability to understand Cézanne’s mind than am I.)



Personal Sketchbook work: In my pocket sketchbook, which has been neglected because of unusually persistent winter weather, a colored-pencil sketch of a tiny flower (6 mm across), species unknown, that blooms here in February. Two drawings in my sketchbook, constructing ellipses in perspective, in preparation for the next part of the current exercise.

Total time: 1 hour 52 min

Wednesday 10 February 2010




Course work: Further work on the “snake-in-hand’ drawing, which is approaching completion.



Reading:



Daniel M. Mendelowitz and Duane Wakeham A Guide to Drawing (Fifth Edition)

Harcourt Brace Jovanovich College Publishers, Orlando, Florida, USA, 1995

Pp 151-173



Personal Sketchbook work: Some mushrooms awaiting preparation for supper.

Total time: 1 hour 38 minutes

Tuesday 9 February 2010




Course work: Started work on a colored pencil drawing of a king snake that I caught, photographed, and released last summer, on an 8 ½ x 11 inch (216 x 279 mm) sheet of smooth drawing paper. I managed to get this one properly placed on the sheet, and am progressing fairly well. (This project is being done as a temporary substitute while I seek a fish, so far unsuccessfully.)



Reading:



Hajo Düchting Cézanne

Taschen, Köln, 1989

Pp 152-169



Personal Sketchbook work: A sketch of a seabird skull (species unknown) that I picked up several years ago. Not too satisfactory: I’m not seeing something quite correctly.

Total time: 3 hours 14 minutes

Monday 8 February 2010




Course work: No luck with the fish today. Drew a cottontail rabbit from a series of photos I took last fall when this rabbit was a regular visitor to the edge of the lawn. Used a small assortment of colored pencils: black, two greys, two browns, and two greens. Didn’t place the drawing on the page as well as I’d planned, and ran out of page before I ran out of rabbit.

Reading:



Hajo Düchting Cézanne

Taschen, Köln, 1989

Pp 99-151



Personal Sketchbook work: A portrait sketch, to refresh my recollections of Assignment Two. Graphite pencil was the medium used. Page placement was a problem here as well, and I still have a tendency to shorten the antero-posterior dimension of the head. Nevertheless, despite its flaws, this is a far better sketch than I could have done before starting the course. I need to do more of these.

Total time: 2 hours 18 minutes

Sunday 7 February 2010




Course work: As the text suggested animal drawing trying a limited selection of colored pencils, I chose a bright orange, an orange-yellow, a blue-violet, black, and mid grey for an attempt at one of the cats. Results are not optimal, and I’ll try again later…perhaps I can catch her more soundly asleep.

Reading:



Daniel M. Mendelowitz and Duane Wakeham A Guide to Drawing (Fifth Edition)

Harcourt Brace Jovanovich College Publishers, Orlando, Florida, USA, 1995

Pp 139-150



Weekly reflections on learning experience: A week of animal work, with varying success. Overall, I think I have made a little progress, especially with the cat drawings, probably because they are always underfoot, whereas working with the horses or the dogs involves going outside in rain, cold, or both. Wild animals are intermittently available, but require a telescope, binoculars, or a camera with a telephoto lens. I also did some experimentation with less-familiar media in my sketchbook this week.



It is interesting to reflect that I’ll have to go fishing in preparation for the next portion of the exercise, as whole fish are not available in area stores, and a frozen fish filet certainly won’t meet the requirement. This part of the learning experience probably wasn’t contemplated by the authors of the course!

Saturday 6 February 2010




Course work: I think the big drawing of the cat is now finished: I’ve certainly managed to capture her personality, and a fairly typical pose. Also, two more quick cat sketches.

Reading:



Hajo Düchting Cézanne

Taschen, Köln, 1989

Pp 7-97



Personal Sketchbook work: A sketch of a floor-lamp, seen from beneath. An apple, sketched with Caran D’Ache Neocolor 2 water-soluble crayons, as further experimentation with this medium. There is a tendency for second applications of color to partially “lift off” earlier ones, and this will require improved handling on my part to manage.

Total time: 2 hours 13 minutes (128h10m)

Friday 5 February 2010




Course work: Sketched a dog (very badly) and a cat (almost as badly) and started work on the large animal drawing. Lacking the required paper, I used a sheet of white Canson paper 500 x650mm (19 5/8 x 25 ½ inches), and drew with sanguine hard pastel, using one of the cat sketches I had previously drawn as a departure point. The details of the markings were taken from old photographs and from several walks back and forth to have a fresh look at the cat. There is more work to do, but I made very good progress, and should finish in another day.

Personal Sketchbook work: A revisit to the shiny metal drawings of Assignment One: part of a very shiny coat-hook with good reflections, sketched with a Design Ebony pencil.

Total time: 2 hours 27 minutes

Thursday 4 February 2010




Course work: Continued with the “Drawing Animals” exercise, concentrating my effort on capturing basic shapes. Only managed three sketches of cats, in charcoal, today.

Reading:



Carol Strickland The Annotated Mona Lisa

Andrews and McMeel, Kansas City, Missouri, USA, 1992

Pp 159-194

(I cannot recommend this book, which claims to be “A crash course in art history…”. It abounds with factual errors…three in the first sentence alone. All of art history before 1800 is skimmed over in 64 pages, with the subsequent two centuries getting twice as many pages. I’ve read it…now I can throw it away.)





Personal Sketchbook work: A charcoal sketch of a white-tailed deer in the yard, from a photo I took.

Total time:1 hour 36 min

Wednesday 3 February 2010




Course work: A hastily-done attempt at a sketch of a dozing horse: he was almost directly up-sun, and detail was poorly seen. Several cat sketches of varying quality, then another partial horse sketch, followed by two more cat sketches. One of these may do as the prototype for the larger animal drawing; I’ll continue to work on data accumulation for a few more days.

Reading:



Carol Strickland The Annotated Mona Lisa

Andrews and McMeel, Kansas City, Missouri, USA, 1992

Pp 126-158



Personal Sketchbook work: A brush sketch of cumulus clouds, a distant tree line, and faraway hills, imaginary.

Total time: 1 hour 44 minutes