Different Media

This exercise was all about trying different media and recording my reactions to them. We are to draw boxes - about 10cm x 5cm - and doodle with each medium. I used my A3 sketchbook...

First picture

Upper left box Willow Charcoal - thick: Lovely for shading, tho' hard to control - don't know exactly where the mark will go on the paper. Freeing to use tho', vary marks depending on pressure, but very smudgy!

Upper middle box Willow Charcoal - thin: Easier to control, tho' not has much variety with different pressures... soooo light to hold *sigh*
Upper right box Cretacolor - hard pastel: Nice to use and control. Similar to thick charcoal re. variety of marks with pressure, like thin charcoal re. ease of use - but with colour!
Lower left box Graphite Stick 2B: Lovely to use, tho' harder pressure is harder for me to control. Great for shading light to medium, but for darker shade better to use hatching... or a darker shade -like 6B! So that's why they have different shades *duh* :)
Lower middle box Coloured Pastel: Lovely to use - if i concentrate! Need to be aware of which edge i'm using. (i think they're the same as Cretacolor, but a not branded...)
Lower right box Water-Soluble Wax Crayon: An old favourite :) Just invites play - tho' not fine work!!

Second picture

Upper left box Artists Pen: Just invites you to draw!! Different thicknesses of nib for different effects. i struggle with the finer nibs - too scratchy - and they do run out...

Upper middle box Chalk Pastel: Can't do fine work, but incredible blending and colour combos!! (These are Winsor & Newton barely used from ebay seller, and are very luvverly!)

Upper right box Woodless Colour Pencil: Just fun to use! Finer than wax crayons - invite play! Need more colours :) More versatile than wooded pencils - can use side for shading aswell as point.

Lower left box Felt Tips: Yuck!! Too scratchy!! i can't control them! Too literal - can even see where the point rests - can't 'suggest' anything... Have given to my daughter...

Lower right box Biro: Perfect medium for sketching on the go. Better than pencil - the point doesn't break!!

Doodling

I've never been much of a doodler...
I never doodled while on the phone - i think it's because i use my hands to talk :)
So Exercise 2 was a challenge, but I felt braver and used A3!
I wrote in my diary:
'I enjoyed the doodling exercise - very freeing!
Practically speaking, felt pens are a faff - getting the tops off and on - then I can't control the scratchy tip.
Crayons and pastels - so much easier. Couldn't resist smudging - tho' I quite like the hard edges among the smudges.
Didn't take long to fill A3.
Consciously trying to keep abstract, but still definite shapes came through.
Need to ponder reason for this...
and What is drawing?'

Making Marks

Exercise 1 is all about holding pens and pencils and seeing what marks they make.

Sounds simple enough, but first you have to get over the blank page...

A3 was just too much, so i plumped for the O-so-familiar A4 :)

I wrote:

'I like the soft and sharp of charcoal :) graphite pencil too hard... i can't control it so well in circles - like pen - i struggle to form o's and c's, etc.'

First beginnings...

My blog name is taken from a quote by John Epstein's self-published Drawing From Life: A Selection of Drawings and Essays (1980).

Here's a longer extract:

Form can only be smelled out and tasted with one's tongue, it cannot be seen with the eye. Thus one must fill one's eyes with one's nose, lips, tongue and ears when onefaces outwards. It is also important to face what one likes. Our appetite for the subject must be full of desire to make it one's own (i.e. 'take it in')... Seek out the smell of the subject, that is the particular quality of its music. Often if a subject feels dead for you, it is because you cannot recognize its smell.

What of those who find this difficult? Let us further our aim to mark out the sensual life. Imagine if this regaining of our senses was a global activity...

It takes an extreme dedicated effort to let go and perceive with one's nose. There is something behind what seems to be. It is in fact right under one's nose, but one needs a diviner or divining process to sense it out.

I know this can all sound a bit la-di-da... but i've actually experienced it when i've been drawing...

I drew this picture about a year after my stroke at a local art class. I had to put the pen on the paper and not look at it again as I drew - I could only look at the bunch of roses.

This technique forces you to draw what you see before you and not what you think you see.

It forced me to really concentrate on the form of each rose, each, leaf, each stem. And yes, I could smell the roses in front of me, through my nose, but I could also sense them. I was tracing out their essential 'roseness', as it were...

None of this was done consciously at the time, but I was reminded of the experience when I read John Epstein's words...

And this is one of the reasons I want to draw:

I want to experience this timeless, placeless, fully present, sensual moment time and time and time again...