Monday night I was at Washington Studio School, although unfortunately the model was a no show. Still, it was a nice group of people and has the benefit of being within walking distance of my apartment. We waited for about half an hour and then left. I went to the Starbucks on Dupont Circle and did a little sketching there. There is a second level there that is great for observing people if you can get into the right corner.
Tuesday night was Hillyer Arts Center which is in an alley behind the Phillips Collection. It was three hours working from short poses to longer ones, the last being about thirty minutes. I have seen the model before at WDC, although I am embarrassed to admit I cannot remember his name. He does some amazingly dynamic poses in the one minute gesture drawings which really get your arm moving. One of the longer poses is (somewhat) captured here:
Pencil On Paper
The right arm is too short, and the left forearm is ridiculously too long in this sketch, but given that it had been some time since I last drew the human form, it was a good warm up.
I was unsure of where I was going, and thus got there about half an hour early, which gave me time to take in the show hanging there. I was especially struck by the work of Lee Gainer, and had I a spare $10,000 and room to hang it, I would definitely buy a piece of her work. You should go check it out.
Wednesday evening I was at WDC. Our model was a young woman named Annie, who has posed there several times when I have been there. She is perhaps my favorite model both for the highly dynamic poses she does in the short and medium length sittings, and for her remarkable consistency in the longer poses.
Pencil On Paper
I think this was a 5 minute pose. I wish it could have been longer so that I could refine the sketch more, but given that she was leaning back onto her elbows I can't imagine she would have been able to hold it much longer.
Pencil On Paper
Pencil On Paper
The last three poses of the evening were the same for twenty minutes each, and we had the option of playing musical chairs to draw from different viewpoints. On both of these I had the advantage of not having to really draw the face, which I am still struggling with.
Thursday evening was back to WSS for a three hour, single pose session. In the sessions where we are beginning with shorter poses and moving into longer (20 minutes or so) ones, I work in an 11 x 14 sketchbook. For the single poses I work on a piece of 18 x 24 drawing paper and stand at an easel.
Pencil On Paper
This drawing is perhaps the most successful thing I have done to date although this is actually not a good photograph of it. The legs are just slightly out of proportion and you can probably tell I REALLY didn't want to draw the chair, but it's the closest I have come to drawing someone's face that actually looked something like the model in question. It was good to feel like progress is being made.
Friday afternoon was again at WSS. I had misread how the session was structured and thus only had my sketchbook. I did several versions of the single pose and liked none of them. It was frustrating to feel like I was taking a step backwards.
One thing I did discover on Friday was that I would much rather draw standing at an easel rather than with the sketchbook in my lap. I may end up buying a portable easel at some point.
I continue with the value studies, trying to do one a day (I did miss a two days last week). I really felt they made a difference in my Thursday night drawing. For the moment I am concentrating on the shapes with hard edges. After another week I will move on to the cylinder, cone and sphere.
Speaking of which, I should get myself back to the easel and draw some pyramids.
Peace in yer crease.
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