Figurative Archives - Page 2 of 12

Posted on 05/26/201404/03/2024 by Joan Vienot — 2 Comments

Representation at Bohlert Massey Interiors — Figurative Works

In early March I received an email from Susan Bohlert Smith, which began “I love your figure drawings.” The email turned out to be an offer to show my drawings at Bohlert Massey Interiors. Bohlert Massey is in the Village of South Walton in Seacrest, an upscale development next to Rosemary Beach, Florida.

I brought about 15 or 20 figure drawings to my first meeting with Susan that Saturday, and discovered that she had already printed many of them from my website as references for the type of work she liked. The next morning she came over to my home/studio and went through my entire inventory of figurative work, leaving with a dozen pieces she wanted to showcase, and directing me to produce more in that same style. Fortunately, the style she liked was my favorite way of working, using white nupastel and graphite on toned paper, and leaving less important parts of the piece undrawn. (So twist my arm!!!)

The drawings are mostly of nudes in various poses, most of them drawn at Studio b when it was located in Alys Beach. (For those of you who are asking, Studio b is presently in between locations — stay tuned.)

Figure drawing, or life drawing, as it is known in the art world, excites me as much as plein air painting, both genres produced in the moment, from direct perception of the immediate subject. Both are constrained by time, plein air painting by the changing light and weather, and life drawing by the duration of the pose, requiring complete, undistracted focus of the artist.

Bohlert Massey Interiors is my sole representation for figurative work on Scenic Highway 30A in South Walton County, Northwest Florida. They will be having a Grand Re-Opening later this summer. Check out a portfolio of Bohlert Massey Interiors at http://www.bohlertmassey.com/portfolio.cfm.

Can you say EXCITED ABOUT THIS? That would be ME!

Posted on 04/20/201404/03/2024 by Joan Vienot — Leave a comment

My Drawing Was Used to Illustrate a Berks Story Project

Well, for 2 seconds anyway, but still, it’s fun to have been involved! It’s in a Berks Story Project interview with author/adventurer Cindy Ross, at http://www.berksstoryproject.com/#!cindy-ross/cmzr. It all began last February when out of the blue, I received an email by way of the contact form on my website:

Hi Joan,
I’m an independent multimedia producer in Reading, PA. I’m writing to ask your permission to use one of your life drawings in one of my forthcoming productions. It is a short video documentary, in the story-telling style of The Moth, about how a woman resolved her conflicts with her father over her choices in life. She mentions in the video that she worked for a number of years as a life drawing model. I would like to show a couple of examples of figure drawings in that section of the video, including this drawing of yours:

https://joanvienotart.wpengine.com/figure-drawing/figure-drawing-how-lucky-am-i-1660#.UvADyvY29Ng
(top left)

The final video will be archived on our web site, berksstoryproject.com. The video will also appear on the web site of our local community access TV station, BCTV.org.

Unfortunately, though, I cannot pay a license fee, but I would certainly give proper credit. The Berks Story Project is a personal project and a labor of love for me and my co-producer. We make no money producing the videos, and we don’t charge viewers fees to watch them.

Please let me know either way whether you will grant us permission to use the drawing.

Sincerely,
David Walker

I was intrigued by the project, which their Facebook page describes as being about the extraordinary stories of ordinary people in Berks County, Pennsylvania.

The Berks Story Project is a growing collection of short multimedia stories about people in Berks County, Pennsylvania. Created in 2009 by David Walker, the project was inspired by intimate first-person narratives told on radio programs such as Story Corps and This American Life. Jane Palmer joined David in 2012 as co-producer. Our mission is to share the extraordinary personal stories of ordinary people in our own community. These are stories about love and war, tragedy, hope and aspiration, dreams lost and found — the universal themes that bind us all. We find them in every corner of Berks, wherever people are willing to open up about a compelling, transformational experience. Joined together like the patches of a quilt, the stories form an evolving narrative of this extraordinary place.

Cindy Ross writes a blog at cindyrosstraveler.com. Here’s The Berks Story Project documentary about Cindy Ross, “What Cindy Wants”. My drawing is shown for about 2 seconds at 3:06, along with drawings by other artists:

Posted on 08/09/201304/03/2024 by Joan Vienot — Leave a comment

Figure Work After Months of Landscapes

Painting of blue-gowned woman sitting against pillows

Fellow plein air painter Judy Dewar initiated her new studio by inviting a few artists over to work from a live model. It was a pleasure working beside Judy, Beckie Perrott, and Marian Pacsuto. I initially intended to paint for the whole session, but a repair contractor was supposed to come to my house, so I needed to be ready to leave on short notice. I took drawing supplies, thinking I would draw until the contractor called, meet him and let him in and come back to Judy’s studio to paint for the rest of the session. The contractor had not called by lunchtime, so I never got out my paints. I enjoyed the 2- and 5-minute warm-ups, using charcoal on good manilla newsprint and on gray student-quality paper before moving on to a 20-minute session using my favorite drawing media – graphite and white nupastel. I drew on tan-tinted Mi-Tientes paper, which has a nice squared texture. For my last piece, over the course of two 30-minute sessions, I used some oil pastels which I had never used before. I had a student-quality set of oil pastel crayons that I’d had for years and years, and a dime-store set of oil pencils for the finer work, both of which I brushed with turpentine after laying in the colors. I gave that final drawing to the model. Below are my warm-ups and my two final pieces. By clicking on them you will get a larger view.

Most of my paintings and images are available for purchase. Contact me if you are interested. — Joan Vienot

Posted on 07/21/201204/03/2024 by Joan Vienot — 2 Comments

After a Month Away, Returning to Figure Drawing

It was exhilarating, returning to figure drawing after more than a month. Colleen Duffley, owner of Studio b, has been in Italy and other exotic places fulfilling her professional photography obligations.

I too have been elsewhere, as my last blog post indicated, including two weeks in British Columbia. So getting out the chalk and paper and easel and coming back to the Studio was like the proverbial oasis in the desert!

I wasn’t too rusty, considering how long it had been, because I had been keeping up with my daily doodling, but more than that, I think what helped me stay in tune was my continuous practice of photography, which is a great tool for maintaining my “eye” and my feeling for composition.

The model this week had amazing turquoise hair, and it demanded to be noticed. As it happens, I have a number of sticks of Nupastel of that exact color, which I had bought expecting eventually to use in background imagery with the colors of the Gulf of Mexico here in Northwest Florida where I live. The Gulf is an impossible blue-green, which looks unbelievable whenever I have used that color in my art, but which is absolutely correct for the color of the model’s hair.

Most of my images are available for purchase. Contact me if you are interested. — Joan Vienot

Posted on 05/13/201204/03/2024 by Joan Vienot — Leave a comment

Figure Drawing at ArtsQuest 2012

One of the premiere art events in Northwest Florida is ArtsQuest, the fine art and music festival held every Mother’s Day weekend. This year it includes 130 international visual artists of all genres. While the artists sit in their booths, musicians perform in the open-air amphitheater, and demonstration areas give attendees opportunity to see art being produced and perhaps even try their hand at something they may or may not have ever tried before.

I am privileged to sit on the Board of Directors of the Cultural Arts Alliance of Walton County which produces the festival. The festival requires the assistance of many volunteers, and Directors are not exempt. So I volunteered to demonstrate figure drawing for two hours yesterday afternoon. Two of the other demonstrating artists joined me, plein air painter Lynette Miesen sketching the model, and Sue Carol Knight Woodley painting. Sue Carol had demonstrated and coached people with portrait painting for the previous two hours, and Lynette was actively plein air painting in front of the Emerald Coast Plein Air Painters booth. Margaret Rogers demonstrated weaving in the booth across from us, displaying many of her gorgeous completed weavings. We were in the courtyard next to the world-famous Bud and Alley’s Restaurant in Seaside, Florida.

The model, Beth Roth, is a professional model, and I asked her to time us so that I could concentrate on drawing. It makes a difference to me whether I am timing the pose or not, as to my level of concentration. When I am in charge of the timer, I find myself doing a little clock-watching, which inhibits the free-flowing abandon I find most conducive to expression. We were under a white tent, and although there were shadows, there was so much light that when I tried to heighten the contrast with a floodlight, I couldn’t tell the difference when I turned it on, so I gave up on that idea.

I encouraged a few passers-by to try their hand at it. One was a professional artist visiting for the festival, and he said that he goes to figure drawing sessions every month or two, because the practice improves his other work. Another had a lot of fun sketching, and she asked for one of my 10-minute sketches, above left. When I gave it to her, she insisted on paying something, so I asked her to put a tip in the kitty for the model, which she was happy to do.

I had a few pre-game jitters but once we got going, I settled in and was hardly aware of the spectators talking and looking over my shoulder as I drew. I did notice the change in pitch as people explained to their children what was going on, and I was thrilled that kids were there. I think it is important to take children to creative venues and to encourage them to make the arts a part of their everyday life.

I know that I would benefit from more portrait study. Neither of the two drawings below do justice to the model’s beauty and serenity, but distortions and all, I count them as successful.

Most of my images are available for purchase. Contact me if you are interested. — Joan Vienot

Posted on 04/24/201204/03/2024 by Joan Vienot — Leave a comment

Types of Lighting

I think of lighting as being one of three primary types: silhouette, which has the most impact if the shape is recognizable by its external contour; high contrast, which treats all of the lighted areas as one light value, and treats all of the shadowed areas as one dark value, or perhaps using only 3 or 4 values; and the last type of lighting, full gradual shading ranging from white through the entire value scale to black, which sometimes is referred to as chiaroscuro, exmplified by the image found in the Art Studio Chalkboard website.

I rarely work on a figure drawing after I get back to my home studio, except to correct a glaring mistake, or to clean up a smudge here or there. But two weeks ago, the model gave us a beautiful pose, and I was unhappy with the drawing I made during the figure drawing session. So I took a new sheet of paper, and redrew the pose using brown ink, showing only the primary two or three values, and leaving a lot of the edges undefined where light was hitting them. This treatment gives the drawing a completely different feeling.

The pose interested me because the model was leaning down with his elbow and forearm on one knee, which foreshortened his torso.

Most of my images are available for purchase. Contact me if you are interested. — Joan Vienot

Posted on 04/23/201204/03/2024 by Joan Vienot — Leave a comment

The Importance of Warming Up in Figure Drawing

I need to warm-up for a little while before my efforts at figure drawing start to flow naturally. During the initial warm-up period, I try to capture the general directional line of the model, and a few of the light and dark patterns, or perhaps some of the essential contours or textures. Often it feels like I am drawing a stick figure, just trying to get the general angles and proportions correct. I draw fast, because our warm-up drawings start with 30-second or 1-minute or two-minute poses. The model often takes slightly off-balance or less comfortable poses during the warm-up period, knowing that he or she doesn’t have to hold them for long. I find that effort on the part of the model inspiring, and it motivates me to try harder. I usually use the broad side of a chalky medium for the warm-up drawings, sometimes even drawing with white nupastel, which helps me to see where the light is striking the model, though white alone usually doesn’t photograph well enough to post here in my blog. I draw with minimal concern for accuracy, sometimes merely trying to switch gears, from the left-brained thinking about my day-job as I drove to the session, to the right-brain activity of figure drawing. Drawing is first of all a physical activity, so like an athlete, an artist needs to work at it a little in order to coordinate the hand with the eye, and a period of warm-up drawings helps with that.

As you can see by the examples below, warm-up gestures have strange lines, curves going the wrong direction, places that get overdeveloped, and other places not drawn at all, wrong proportions, and yet an undeniable essence of the figure. These are warm-up gestures of the same pose from this past week’s figure drawing session at Studio b: one by me, one by Nancy Nichols Williams, and one by Steve Wagner.

2012-0418 Nancy Williams gesture — Nancy Williams

2012-0418 Steve Wagner gesture — Steve Wagner

I enjoy the time spent warming-up, but 2-minutes is always too short. But then too, 5 minutes is too short, and so is 20 minutes, and come to think of it, rarely is a pose long enough for me to feel like I actually finished! The next drawings include another of my warm-up gestures, and then two longer drawings, perhaps 20-minutes or 30 minutes. I left early from this session, exhausted from teaching all day, the 2nd of a 2½ day crash-course that I teach at a nearby college, certifying swimming pool operators to meet health department requirements.

Most of my images are available for purchase. Contact me if you are interested. — Joan Vienot

Posted on 04/02/201204/03/2024 by Joan Vienot — Leave a comment

Figure Drawing in a New Venue

It was interesting to draw in a new location last week. Studio b. has moved to a nearby community, and the room was filled with unsorted moving boxes, furniture, and art. The ordered disarray appealed to me. The ambience at the new location is much warmer, with rich woods instead of cold plaster and tile, and with plentiful windows which let in light from every angle. I was in heaven during the warm-up drawings, the low sun adding warm tones. The model chose her own poses during the shorter warm-up sets. Light from the multiple sources put complex highlights and subtle double shadows on the model’s skin. As usual, most of the short poses were standing poses or twisting poses, perhaps even a little off-balance, which would be too hard to hold for any duration. The longer poses were as always, more stable as a matter of compassion for the model.

For the final pose, the model sat on the stairway to the second floor, where the single light source simplified the shadow patterns. I sat at the base of the stairs where I could see her from that unusual vantage point. What interested me the most was the exposed underside of her chin and her upturned nose. The foreshortening had to be kept subtle even though it felt extreme, with her arm being larger because of its proximity to me.

I am happy with the end result in every respect except for one — it doesn’t look very much like the actual model! Generally speaking, when drawing a portrait I count it a success if the positions of the eyes, nose, and mouth seem parallel. Maybe if I practiced portraiture more often, I would be able to capture the likeness better.

It’s a challenge to create something someone might want to hang in their home. It seems like the drawing either needs to wow the viewer with technical craftsmanship or else it needs to be someone they know or to remind them of someone they know. In the end, I draw for my own pleasure and compulsion, trying to simplify what I see, to capture the essential character of the person or the expression I interpreted without concern for whether someone else will like it.

At left is a photo of me making the drawing posted above.

I am excited to announce that a few pieces of my art will be hanging in the lobby/reception area of the South Walton Center of Northwest Florida State College here in Santa Rosa Beach, Florida. The opening reception will be Friday, April 6, 2012, from 5:00 to 7:00 PM. Titled “A Passion for Art”, the show spotlights the members of the A+Art Committee which serves under the umbrella of the Cultural Arts Alliance of Walton County. The show exhibits works by Charlotte Arnold, Lauren Carvalho, Betty Cork, Miffie Hollyday, Susan Lucas, Mike McCarty, Robin Wiesneth, and me, Joan Vienot. The show will close May 15, 2012.

Most of my images are available for purchase. Contact me if you are interested. — Joan Vienot

Posted on 03/24/201204/03/2024 by Joan Vienot — Leave a comment

Time Warp — Where’ve I Been?

What a whirlwind my life has been for the past month or so. In my “day-job,” I own and manage a service business which supports the local tourist industry. Here in Northwest Florida, that translates to being incredibly busy for the 5 weeks of high school and college spring breaks, when families vacation here, and then from late May to mid-August, again coinciding with school summer vacations. Many companies here begin hiring for the season in February, and as everyone gears up for the onslaught of tourists, seasonal high-wage jobs attract employees away from the more moderately paid year-round jobs such as my company offers. Consequently, even though I guarantee 40 hours a week through-out the whole winter season, I sometimes lose employees to higher-paying jobs in the spring. So far this year I’ve lost 2, which is 15% of my staff. Losing even one employee is unsettling, with the rest of the staff making up the difference in the workload while a new employee is being trained. I’ve been busier than usual with other activities as well. My efforts at maintaining inner peace by meditation, working out, and a healthy lifestyle, are taxed by stress, and I think my art reflects that.

All that is introduction to my confession that I wasn’t as focused at the most recent session of figure drawing at Studio b. as I would like to have been. The group of artists was energized, and there was a lot of activity downstairs below our drawing studio, as Colleen Duffley, owner of Studio b., coordinated the packing for transport to the new location. Even with all of that going on, she came upstairs to serve us whatever we wanted to drink. So the environment was supportive, but nevertheless, I struggled with my drawings.

We ran through the usual warm-up gestures and worked our way up to 20- or 30-minute poses by the end of the 2½ hours. Following are some of my efforts.

Most of my images are available for purchase. Contact me if you are interested. — Joan Vienot

Posted on 02/23/201204/03/2024 by Joan Vienot — 4 Comments

Letting Go

It was difficult to let go of whatever was on my mind so I could draw last night. The room at Studio b. was already set up when I got there, so there really was no reason for me not to be able to clear my mind. Garrett had my easel standing where I usually stand, and he already had the model’s stand set up, with a tip jar put out, and several chairs were set up around the room for other artists. Music was playing, as always.

We didn’t warm up quite as long as we usually do, because one of the artists was going to have to leave early, so we jumped right into some longer poses after only four 2-minute warm-ups. But I don’t think that was the issue — I just kept an undercurrent of distraction going the whole night, about nothing of any consequence.

My other drawings are pictured below.

Most of my images are available for purchase. Contact me if you are interested. — Joan Vienot