Astounding!

Albert Bierstadt, I've just discovered, was a Hudson River School artist, so those beautiful images of his on our 2nd blog assignment were not done by photographs, but painted.

I love ink washes! (at least with the brush)

Brush and ink is fun to work with; I feel like I have more control. It's certainly better than repeatedly dipping a stick into an ink well. Working with ink washes is probably the most agreeable thing we've done all semester; once I get past the initial line drawing, the process is relatively easy.
     I was very selective about the location I chose to draw; I didn't want to have to set up in a place where I had to find a support for my drawing board or drag a chair. I finally decided to go behind the library, where there's a patio with tables and chairs.

Noon

Late afternoon

Early evening

I wish I had done a preliminary sketch. Oh well. With the season and daylight savings time, the evening was not the best time to work, since the sun went behind the clouds. It was a beautiful day today, though, especially during high noon. I felt a sense of tranquility and placidity while working on this drawing. I was a little surprised to find myself enjoying this at first, since I generally don't like working outside, but today was a good day, apparently in more ways than one.  For once, I wasn't running from bees or anything like that, and the only thing that startled me and broke my concentration, briefly, was the loud slamming of an upstairs door to the balcony, which happened a few times.

Mark making that creates Value

Naturally, the hardest part of this assignment (thus the most time-consuming) was finding decent images from reputable sources, that wouldn't have copyright issues. It's just so hard to look for worthwhile images in the public domain, or maybe I'm supposed to spend a couple of hours sifting through Internet search results. In any case, this is why I hate these types of assignments. The posting is easy; it's the finding that causes me trouble. I just wish I could snap my fingers (or wrinkle my nose or shake my ponytail) and it's done. Alas. Well, here we go:

Georges Seurat

This is one of Seurat's sketches, probably a study for one of his paintings or pure practice, I don't know.  Here he uses hatch-like mark making to create a buildup of value, rather than his famous Pointillist color techniques. Even though this image has a largely grayscale range, I think it's successful in creating planes of value. There aren't many dark values, but there are lighter areas where he barely touched the paper, to indicate depth and separation of planes. He also conveys a deep sense of space, with more clarity towards the foreground of the picture plane. Notable, is the fact that he used a toned paper with only a dark medium, probably charcoal or conte, contributing to the grayscale contrast of the sketch.

Georges Seurat

This is an image of one of Seurat's paintings, which I 'borrowed' from IgoUgo.com. (For whatever reason, it's copyrighted.) I chose this image to give a sense of the work that Seurat is most famous for. I think that this piece is also successful in creating planes of value through mark making. Seurat uses a multiplicity of dabs of color to imply an outdoor scene. The color values in the objects contain subtleties, reflected lights upon the water's surface and direction of light source upon the tree line particularly. He has even included the reflection of the vessel in the mid ground, which acts as an area of emphasis. The painting also includes depth-of-field.

Albrecht Durer

Albrecht Durer--master sketcher, painter, and etcher. Here is an etching of the Madonna and Child, with crosshatching techniques and great attention to detail. We see Durer paying attention to the separation of planes, modeling of the forms,  and subtle gradations within the planes. His treatment of the etching forms a smooth modulation between white and ?10% grey- well, really, really dark gray, since I'm not sure about the percentage. And there are touches of black her and there. The key with this being an etching, is the proximity of the hatch marks and quantity, since you can't really achieve mark variation by cutting into a plate, i.e. thickness, weight. Also important to mention, is that Durer does not neglect the planes in the faces; only the halos behind the Madonna's and Child's heads fall flat within the broad circle with no value.

Kathy Kollwitz

Whenever I think of Katy Kollwitz, I think of The Peasant's Revolt. Unfortunately,  it doesn't have enough variation for me to use for this assignment; most of her work seems to be fairly dark. This piece, which appears to be an ink drawing was the best mark making example I could find. Although there aren't many grays, she does create distinctions among the objects within space through her mark making. The more discernible marks at toward the foreground contribute to a sense of depth within the picture plane, as the things that are farther away are less demarcated. Without drawing contours, Kollwitz gives the drawing clarity with her carefully controlled hatching and crosshatching. Where the draped forms of the bedding are concerned, she uses lines that conform to the curves of the drapery and the contours of the bedridden figure, instead of using strictly directional lines. Some use of ink wash is also visible.

I close this post with this obvious, impolite remark: There is some disturbing, disgusting shit posted online. Pardon my use of an expletive, and have a nice day.

Just for Laughs

Recall that I warned about the terror of the ink smudges. Well speaking of horrifying, smear-prone fluids, here's a little clip that ought to jog the collective memories of several generations of Americans. I present to you, the famous horror music from Psycho:

My Ink Landscape Drawing

The blogger is back!

(At least for one or two posts) I know all my adoring fans have anticipated my return. Thank you; you've been a beautiful crowd.

But seriously,

The landscape drawing was a very time-consuming, frustrating and relaxing experience all at once. Time-consuming because (well it's obvious) it's stick and ink; frustrating because of the many times I had to reload the stick and the occasional bugs flying near me (dear heavens, a bee stopped by to visit my paper; and relaxing because the sunlight was just beautiful, and I did it at home here in Jackson, MS, from the comfort of my own front door walkway. I stood 1 foot or so above my drawing board, which I had laid flat on a TV tray. This became a bit exhausting every now and then, but fortunately, I had brought my little chair outside to rest on. These are two shots of the scenic street "landscape".

In my opinion, these two photographs are much more attractive than the actual drawing I executed. Oh well; at least the pictures look good. And I did spend quite some time on it too. Of course I ran low on ink with no way to get any more, and blah, blah, blah. Plus I was exhausted, had other, more important matters to tend to, and the light changed drastically. But I think I would have overworked it if I had kept going. I neglected some structural details, since this is a landscape drawing.

Beware!

Here comes the zinger: ink smudges! Several times I had the misfortune of getting a little excess of ink on the paper, and trying to wipe it up with my finger was a bad idea. Behold, the birth of the smudge monster. Mwahahahahahaha!

Are you afraid of the dark?

Here's a nice episode for "Tales from the Crypt". Seriously though, drawing at nighttime is challenging, simply because you're drawing in the dark. I felt safer just doing it from the apartment balcony; people are crazy, especially in Memphis, apparently. And even though the security truck drives around the dorms, there are still weirdos who pass by on Poplar. Granted, drawing at night has an advantage over drawing during the day-- no mosquitoes, no sun glare, and no numerous groups of people passing be every 20 seconds. The traffic is a different story--I don't care what time it is, there are always at least three or four cars passing by at a time, but I guess that's what happens when you live on Poplar Avenue.

It was a little strange to have a homework assignment that you actually have to wait till it's dark to do. But there's an excitement to drawing at night, if only a nervous one. The main thing going through my mind is, I want to get the hell back inside. Plus, it's cold now. Dang, Fall has hardly begun and the temperatures drop by nearly half of what they were two weeks ago. It's still pretty cool knowing that many artists, including the famous Leornardo da Vinci, did paintings and drawings at night. For the record, when it comes to being outside alone, I am afraid of the dark.