Sneaking Some Time to Feed the Inner Artist

Here in the U.S., our long holiday season filled back to back activities and commitments will often rob us of our easel time, time that we all cherish and far too often wish we had more of.  Here's a fun thing you can do in your sketchbook with your feet up watching TV.  It's especially fun during a sports event, but any program where people are doing stuff on the screen will work.

It's the simplest form of gesture drawing taught by Kimon Nicolaides early in the 20th century.  Today, it remains one of the most powerful ways for artists to grab a quick idea.  One example is the sketch Andrew Wyeth did as his initial idea for Christina's World.  

This shorthand method of studying draws only what the figure is doing, not the edges of the shapes.  It's quick, no more than 30 seconds.  Here's one I did of a man sitting.  My attention is on man sitting.  Once the pen starts moving, I follow the feeling of what the head is doing, what the torso is doing, the arms, legs and feet.  Not what it is, but what it is doing.

Below, I've broken down a process I use to give you an idea of how it works. First, what is the head doing?

Next, what the torso is doing?

Finally, what the legs and feet are doing?

Here's a page from my 2011 sketchbook done while I watching the Atlanta Braves play.

Doing pure gesture drawing where you are capturing the movement-- only what the subject is doing-- can feed the inner artist in ways you never could believe.  Give it a try.  

A Fun Way To Abstract

Behind every good painting is a sound abstract design.  In visual art most of the 20th century was devoted to some sort of abstraction.  Today many artists paint abstractly, but to a lot of people abstraction is meaningless. That's too bad because understanding abstraction can go a long way towards enhancing a realistic work whether photo-realistic or more impressionistic.

Here is an experiment that can open up for you one way abstraction can work.  In science, experiments often begin with setting intentions, so that's what we will do first.  The subject is the photo of tomatoes below.

OUR INTENTIONS

1. We will use only one tool, a flat brush, and with it we will use only a straight, flat stroke

2.  We will focus only on color

3.  Each stroke will take on a different direction than the previous stroke of the same color

4.  Each color is repeated at least twice.

First pass:  Doing those four intentions, we'll place the lighter value reds of the tomatoes.

Second Pass:  Still using the four intentions, we'll use the darker reds.

Third Pass:  We add the lighter greens.

Fourth pass:  We add the darker greens.

Fifth pass:  The lighter grays.

Sixth pass: The darker neutral reds

Seventh pass:  The darker grays

Eighth pass:  The middle value greens

Ninth pass:  More light grays and the abstract is complete

The sequence of color selection doesn't matter.  What matters is following the four intentions.  

 

Here is the subject and the abstract that grew out of it..  Why not try choosing a photo and abstracting it using this process.