- Learn more about the artist and how he/she approached a subject
- Learn about the artist's strokes and ways of treating value, line, etc.
- Learn to see ever better - all drawing practice is about that, ultimately!
- Have fun re-creating something so beautiful!
Today I had some time in art class because I only had two students so I took my own advice and drew a couple of nudes, one by Matisse and the other by Manet.
In drawing the image by Matisse, I learned how he used charcoal - he had a lot of pentimiento lines (thoughts, "mistakes", first tries) which he eventually smudged out which created falue in some cases, depth in others. I became aware again of how distorted, yet oddly accurate his images are - surely this woman's left breast (the one on the right in the image) didn't poke out of her chest as shown here - but it works. We certainly know what we're looking at. How do artists get to the point where they break off from reality and yet draw images that are completely recognizeable? I don't know how to do that - yet!
The image by Manet was fun - is the model pregnant? Does she have nipples? What's behind her? There seem to be a couple of other figures partially indicated. Her left hand (on the right in the image) is completely messed up - illegible! - but gone into with darker marks, helping disguise that fact. I wouldn't have noticed if I hadn't drawn it myself.
Doing these sketches made me want to get back to drawing figures - it's been quite a few years since that was my focus. Perhaps I'll make that a priority for a bit and see what happens!
In drawing the image by Matisse, I learned how he used charcoal - he had a lot of pentimiento lines (thoughts, "mistakes", first tries) which he eventually smudged out which created falue in some cases, depth in others. I became aware again of how distorted, yet oddly accurate his images are - surely this woman's left breast (the one on the right in the image) didn't poke out of her chest as shown here - but it works. We certainly know what we're looking at. How do artists get to the point where they break off from reality and yet draw images that are completely recognizeable? I don't know how to do that - yet!The image by Manet was fun - is the model pregnant? Does she have nipples? What's behind her? There seem to be a couple of other figures partially indicated. Her left hand (on the right in the image) is completely messed up - illegible! - but gone into with darker marks, helping disguise that fact. I wouldn't have noticed if I hadn't drawn it myself.
Doing these sketches made me want to get back to drawing figures - it's been quite a few years since that was my focus. Perhaps I'll make that a priority for a bit and see what happens!
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