Nov 23

Our one day of class this week (due to Thanksgiving break) was spent in the Minnesota area. Our first stop was the Walker Art Museum. I had never been there so I wasn't sure what to think, but I was pleasantly surprised by the art! Most of it was very very intriguing and vivid. One of the first floors we went on (I believe 7) had this piece of moving tin foil that sort of hovered across the floor, and I really enjoyed that. One other piece that truly stood out in my mind was a piece titled "White Field" by Gunther Uecker. It was simply (and not so simply) a board with nails hammered in it. The nails appeared to be bent and leaning in some areas; much like a grass field would do in the wind. That feeling was really great, and was captured really well.
After the Walker, we made our way to the Bell Museum of Natural History. Here our assignment was to explore and then pick an animal to draw. Me and a few other students sat on the home-made "bog" and drew the stuffed caribou in the opposite case. I am not so happy with the way my drawing turned out and I think if I would've focused on one part of the animal I would have been more satisfied. I believe the proportions are right on and believable, but I feel like it's lacking detail and depth. If I were to do it again I would either choose a different animal, or focus on the face of the caribou.

Nov 15 - Nov 19

This week in life drawing was pretty short. Class was canceled on Tuesday (or so I was told), I wasn't going to go anyway due to sleep deprivation. This week in general has been one of my busiest and most stressful, so having a break from Life Drawing was really nice.
Thursday was all about learning how to add ink to our shells. We were each told to bring in black ink plus another ink of our choice; I chose a burnt orange color. I was not looking forward to having to add ink to our shells, I mean they took this long to get the contour line drawings down so I was scared to ruin it with ink. And, after looking at past examples of shells, I became nervous that mine wouldn't turn out as beautiful. I was scared to even begin painting on my practice shell (here it is)....

BUT it was actually a ton of fun. My thoughts and concerns have changed completely!  I started out really carefully, only using the minimal amount of ink, but I soon realized that you kind of just have to go for it. I feel like I did okay for just a quick 25 minute paint job, and even the mistakes are beautiful. I am glad we got to do this in class because now I know what needs to be done and how the ink, paper, and brush react to each other. I wasn't too fond of how my burnt orange ink turned into a pink at first, but now I don't think it's so bad after all. I am not looking forward to drawing another shell, but adding the ink to it will be fun!

Nov 8 - Nov 12

This week in Life Drawing was pretty interesting. We only had class once and we spent the majority of the time listening to a lecture about the legs/foot muscles, going over our second shell drawing and doing a long drawing of the feet.
My second shell turned out pretty well, definitely a lot fast than the first. I tried new techniques with this shell (the things I was told to work on with the last one). I used less lines and only 3 lines going on the long axis of the shell. We were told we didn't totally need them, and that if they were added they would have to have enough movement and depth as the other lines. I like having both, so I'm happy with the way my shell turned out in that sense. I also did not have any sort of outline on my shell this time. However, I was still told that I need to work on curving my lines around more to make the edge more implied {I do not know what I'm doing wrong here- so any suggestions or examples would be nice}. After the feed back from both, it will be interesting to see what the next shell turns out to look like.

I've always struggled with drawing the feet so it was nice to get a few hours to JUST focus on them during class. I got two completely different angles with each foot so it was good practice. The first foot was completely straight on, while the second was completely in profile. I struggled a bit with both, especially the foot that was straight on. It was difficult to capture the whole foot while avoiding any distortion. The foreshortening of the toes was also a struggle. Overall, though, I was pretty satisfied. I'm looking forward more drawings of the feet and to an attempt at hands in the future!

 

 We also had assignments to begin adding muscles to feet and rest of the leg.

Nov 1 - Nov 5

I can't believe how fast this week went. The first day of class (tuesday) was spent doing gesture drawings and then a long pose. I'm enjoying seeing the progress I'm making, especially after doing the Flickr account! It's interesting to see where I was and now where I am. My gesture drawings seem to be getting the most improvement, which a relief, but even now they still can be a struggle.

As our long drawings get longer I find myself sort of zoning out near the end; running out of steam you could say. That's something I need to work on. It seems like so long ago, with Drawing II, could I sit for 3 hours and draw and maybe take one break. I do, however, find that as the poses get more difficult I'm able to draw them better. Learning about foreshortening has definitely helped with that struggle. Even from day one we were all dealing with foreshortening, and now it's reassuring to know the "rules" on that.
The horizontal drawing is from Tuesday and the arm has foreshortening (even more so than on the models pose for me today).



The pose we had today (Thursday) was very similar to one that I had already done. The nice part about that was that I could compare and contrast the two, and noticing the difference really helped! It was good to see that my torso was actually the right height this time (not so elongated), and the legs were pretty accurate as well!