Figure Drawing: Going Into the Quiet

“Everything that’s created comes out of silence.  …All creativity requires some stillness.  Going into the quiet and listening will heal and inspire you.” ~Dr. Wayne Dyer

My art comes out of the quiet.  I require stillness.  It doesn’t usually bother me if someone makes a single statement while I am “in the zone,” but if they expect an answer from me, they might have a long wait, because the creative part of my brain, the visual  side, doesn’t communicate with words.  Early in the drawing session, thoughts may come in bits and pieces, feelings and memories or colors and echoes rather than words, and they gradually settle like leaves falling from a tree, leaving my mind empty and clear and clean.  This is when I can best achieve what I am trying to do, when what I see goes through the filter of Joan Vienot and manifests on paper.  That doesn’t mean it is a perfect representation of what everyone else would see, but rather a representation of my studies, my struggles, and my “me”.

Figure drawing is immediate, constrained by the short duration of the pose.  The hurried pace requires me to be wholly focused.  The “creative zone” is a very different state of mind.  I lose track of time and place.  The other artists cease to exist.  The model rapidly becomes a pattern of lines, shapes, textures and shadows, pure beautiful human form, no longer an individual, no longer a “naked person”.  I get lost in a silence of my own making.  There have been times I have looked up and seen someone’s mouth moving but not heard the sound.  It is always a rude awakening when the instructor or moderator announces the end of the pose.

Tonight Studio b. had a new model, a very fit woman.  Her health and vitality were inspiring.  Nevertheless, it is difficult “learning” how to draw a new model.  Graphic novelist Will Davis led us in a number of warm-up drawings and we concluded with a few longer poses and finally with a 35 minute pose.  I used white and garnet Nupastel on Canson Mi-Teintes paper (oyster) for this final pose.