Drawing 1, Part 2, Project 2 Exercise 1
Project 2 – Detailed Observation of Natural Objects
Own image and photograph (accessed 27/03/2019)
In this image I tore open a tomato pulling out the inside. In this image I worked on the detail and tone, trying to build up the dark medium and light tones. I used some hatching and crosshatching .
Own image and photograph (accessed 27/03/2019)
In this image I have used coloured pencils of various different colours to build up the tone and create areas of dark and light.
Review of this work
I think that tone can be shown in many different ways and different media. When using the coloured pencils it is possible to use many different colours to show the different tones. For example where there is dark tone in the above image I used purple, not a colour you would think about when drawing a tomato but purple is there in the dark tone. I could probably have used more creative mark making, but I have used cross-hatching and hatching where this pattern fitted with the image.
If I had used a cloth to put the tomato on I could have changed the image, and this could have complemented the colour of the tomatoes so something like a greeny blue would have worked. I like the contrast of the white plate and the red tomatoes though.
https://www.vincentvangogh.org/still-life-with-quinces.jsp. (Accessed 27/03/2019
This combination of colours in Vincent Van Gogh (1853-1890) ‘Still Life with Quinces’ contains many different colour to give the image more depth.
Project 3 – Still Life
Exercise 1 – Still life using line
(Own image, own photograph) (accessed 11/04/2019)
I chose these items for this still life because they had interesting textures and I thought they would work well in the context of using line. They are natural objects and are all spiky in some way. I felt that it was important that the textures were interesting, although I have included the smoother shell as a contrast. The way that I treated the objects changed, I began with the cactus and realised that in making the cactus black and the spikes white this would create the right spiky look that I wanted.
I also liked that negative elements to this and thought that would make the drawing more interesting. With the textures on the shell I thought this would stand out and look more interesting with a black background. This seems to have allowed the shell to look more 3D which was what I was hoping for.
I felt that placing the highest item in the centre with the other items around it would allow the cactus to be black against the white which would help to highlight it. I really likes the spikes and will look to use cactus in the future. Using two different coloured backgrounds allows the objects to be placed where they would benefit from the black or the white behind them. This is something that I hadn’t thought about much before, but splitting the background makes sense when trying to get different objects to stand out or move back in an image. I did however find it difficult to show the smoothness of the large shell, when using line like this it is better to show the smoothness by using tone.
I used dipping pen and black ink which I think makes line easier to show and created the look that I wanted. I found that light was difficult to show when using line and I will look at how I can show line better. In my thumbnails I moved the cactus about and looked at landscape and portrait, but ended up with the composition that I chose mainly to show the cactus to its best.
Exercise 2 – Still life in tone using colour.
I have been researching ‘Still Life’ and have found that it is a genre that many artist work in. In visiting Tate Modern, I saw a painting by Paul Klee (1879-1940), which made me look further at the cubism style, the painting I saw was not a still life but this made me research the work that he did.
https://www.moma.org/collection/works/33358 (accessed 11/04/2019)
This painting by Paul Klee shows a still life and the tone is clear using colour. The background is so dense and rich, the fruit really shine out from the painting. The areas of light are yellow and contrast with the dark of the background.
I have gone on to look at the work of Karl Knath (1891-1971), his work with collage and still life using cubism are similar to Paul Klee
(Own Image – Own Collection) (accessed 11/04/2019)
Some of these objects were together in the house eg the fruit bowl and the blue bottle and that is what started the choice of objects. The fabric is a top but used as a cloth, I felt that the patter went well with the composition, I added the rabbit at the end, I felt that I wanted to show more tone in the image.
When I was creating the composition I decided to put the bottle at the back so that the eye is taken from the rabbit and up to the bottle. I think the fruit bowl is too round and looks like I was looking down on it rather than from the side. I am working on my ellipses but this is still not right.
The concept came from surroundings and what surrounds us, what everyday objects mean to us. The rabbit and the bowl came from my mother in-laws house and has always meant something to me, although I had not thought about where they had come from in a long while. The objects are just there always around me, drawing them made me look at them again, in a different way. When visited Tate Modern recently I noticed that artists often paint what is around them, they tend to paint their studios or things that they use. Georges Braque (1882-1963), painted many still life paintings of the things around him, I particularly like the use of mixed media in his work and would like to try some collage with still life.
http://collection.imamuseum.org/artwork/49531/ (Accessed 17/04/2019)
Georges Barque – Still life with pink fish.
I tried with this coloured pencil drawing to look at the tone and where the tones were dark and light. I found it difficult to work in a loose way using the medium that I chose, I seemed to draw very tightly finding it difficult to create a more sketchy look, I think I worked too slowly and methodically. I seemed to have some tonal colour in the image, the bottle didn’t work as well as I would have like. I like the blue in the image and the orange as the two colours contrast well.I think that in the end the tone is evident and the colours work well together.
When I did the thumb-nail sketches for this image I moved the bottle around and changed the lighting to get the light coming from behind the image as the light comes in from the window. I decided on just a suggestion of the background would be enough as I didn’t want to detract from the still life itself.
Own Image, Own Photograph (Accessed 17/04/2019)
Exercise 3 – Experiment with mixed media
I have been looking at the work of Georges Braque, I also looked at some other artists who worked in mixed media and still life. This of course brought me to Pablo Picasso, Collage, seems to have played a big role in his work so this is where I started.
Own Image, Own Photograph (Accessed 17/04/2019)
Testing ideas for Exercise 3.
I really wanted to use the collage as a background to show different textures and allow this to show through the image as well as around it. Using dip pen and back and white ink I found that the marks were interesting and allowed the texture of the starfish to show. I wanted the viewer to know how rough the starfish would feel just by looking at the image.
I decided to carry on with the concept of drawing the objects that surround me and so I chose the fish that I was going to cook along with a shell that has been in my kitchen for a long time. The fish was wrapped in a thin plastic which was difficult to draw but I have used collage and white and grey pen as well as pencil to try and get the semi opaque look to it. It is more graphic than I would have liked, as I feel the object don’t tie together as well as I would have liked. I really like the shell and feel that the texture worked well with this.
The objects were lit from above, although I did try lighting them from the side but I really wanted the fish to shine. I tried different objects but felt that I wanted a range of textures in the image so in the end I decided on the shell and the fish for there very different textures. The lemon I have tried to use to join the two objects together and make the image more whole. I chose to draw the object from above because I wanted the marking on the fish to show and this did not work as well from other angles.
I have used dip pen with white and black in which really helped to describe the texture of the shell along with marker pens to add the colour that was required. I let the background blue show through the fish and the grey background show through the shell. The white ink and dip pen created the scaly texture of the fish, along with thick black marker for the stripes. I also used coloured pencils to add colour in the lemon and the Mackerel. The dip pen really allows the background to come through the image which I really liked, made it more interesting and fishy.
Own Image, Own Photograph (Accessed 17/04/2019)
Exercise 3 – Finished work.
Exercise 4 – Monochrome
Research
I started by looking at some artists that have worked using monochrome.
The work of Anish Kapoor (b 1954), was suggested by my tutor and I have been looking at his drawings, particularly the way that he blurs the boundaries between reality and illusion. For instance you think that the drawing is of one thing, but it could really be of another thing. The dish, that when you look at it straight on it turns into a hole so deep and dark. His flat drawings have depth that allow the viewer to feel like they are looking past the drawing and deep into the image, like looking into a hole. They can also appear to protrude out at the viewer and some images seem to do both, draw the viewer in then look like the drawing is protruding out all in the same image.
Anish Kapoor Drawings, by Jeremy Lewison, published by Tate Gallery (1990)
(Photograph own collection accessed 17/04/2019).
This Vaginal image seems to draw the viewer into the red but the red has a phallic quality too protruding from the image.
I have looked at Ben Nicholson (1894-1982) and his work using white relief and the shadows that are created using this technique.
Yves Klein (1928-1962) was known for his blue monochrome work, said to have come from his love of the French Mediterranean skies. Printing with real human bodies, created images that look female even though they are a series of blue marks on a white canvas that seem to have movement built into them.
Marc Chagall (1887-1985)
https://www.masterworksfineart.com/catalogue-raisonee/blue-still-life/ (Accessed 17/04/2019).
Marc Chagall is also known for the blue and colour in his work although he worked in black and white too making etchings and lithographs. This is very loose but really atmospheric which is what is interesting about it.
Exercise 4
Own Image, Own Photograph (Accessed 05/06/2019)
I began by looking at the pears above and looking at how the light falls on them and how the blue pastel could best be used to create the shape. This exercise was helpful when I did the exercise below in describing the shapes of the vegetables. I have found that using the eraser as a drawing tool can help to pick out the areas of light.
I again carried on with the concept of what surrounds me, and as I love to cook there are alway ingredients around my kitchen. I wanted to really observe these vegetables and really see how complex they are and how the different surfaces can be depicted. The smooth shiny aubergine and the bumpy uneven surface of the asparagus stems.
Own Image, Own Photograph (Accessed 05/06/2019)
OCA Drawing 1 