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Changing Perspective in Figure Drawing

Our model this week at Studio b.‘s regular weekly figure drawing session stood on a ladder during the warm-up drawings and the shorter warm-up poses, and she also posed up on a table.  Usually our model is on a short platform or even on the floor, so this change in perspective was a rare treat.  I enjoyed the challenge of drawing from a lower vantage point.  Every shape was different from how we normally see our model.  To add to the challenge, we positioned a floodlight to light her from below.

The model brought a hat, a mask, and a necklace to give us some accents.

I used some different media to loosen up from the intense figure drawing workshop Heather Clements taught last Saturday at Studio b.  I had not sketched since Saturday, and I felt like I had really tightened up, hence my decision to use less familiar media, to force myself to “let go”.  Interesztingly, I think my most successful piece of the evening was one of these looser pieces, using water-soluble Aquarelle pencil on hot press watercolor paper, the study of the model wearing the mask, above left.  It is small, only 4½” x 6″.

I throw away almost all of my warm-up drawings.  Colleen Duffley, owner of Studio b., suggested saving more gestures, explaining to me that some people have more appreciation for anonymous gestures than for finished drawings of a model they don’t know.  This poses a dilemma.  I do so many warm-up drawings, or gestures, that I always use an inferior grade of paper, for the sake of economy.  Newsprint and manilla paper costs just pennies, as opposed to good paper which can run from $1.65 to $3.50 per sheet, and upwards.  So the few times that a warm-up drawing turns out to be a keeper, its value is compromised because of the poor quality of paper.  It can be redrawn on archival paper, but that is a challenging task because the immediacy of expression, the passion, will be difficult to recreate.  So I decided to bring a tablet of 18 x 24 Canson Cream that I had bought a good 6 months ago, and I did all of my warm-up drawings on good paper.  I missed the rough texture, or “tooth” of the manilla and gray bogus papers I usually warm up on — the tablet of good paper is very smooth.

Below left is one of my warm-up drawings, a 5 minute pose, and the other two are longer poses on Stonehenge and Rives.

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

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Figure Drawing with Confidence

When I was first learning to draw, as a child, I remember making a myriad of feathery lines to indicate an edge.  Sometimes I still catch myself doing that.  But my drawings are more successful when I draw single, confident lines, whether they are “right” or not.  After all, that’s part of the beauty of present day art — our culture allows and even encourages the artist to be expressive without worrying so much about technical accuracy.  Of course it is nice to have both, but if you have to sacrifice one, I think it is better to sacrifice accuracy in favor of confident expression.

But that is not to say that one should not strive for accuracy and technical merit.  Our model at Studio b. this week was very fit, a specimen, actually, perfect for studying developed musculature.  But none of our poses were long enough to do justice to basic anatomy, so I attempted to describe her muscular development by drawing the outer contours.  The lines are not perfect;  even an untrained eye can see that there are exaggerations and out-and-out “wrong” lines.

In the moment though, in the rush of the 25-minute pose, every line feels perfect, every line is drawn with confidence, the muse shouting at the top of her voice.

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

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The Challenge to Draw Fast

Different participants in the figure drawing sessions at Studio b. may have different expectations.  Some are drawing in preparation for a painting, some for technical skill and craftsmanship, some to stretch their creativity, some to improve their ability to see, and some are attempting to complete a finished drawing.

I don’t think there is anything that challenges me as much as working from a live model.  I work towards amost all of the above goals, except that I am never preparing to paint.  A completed drawing is my highest hope and my favorite art form.  That does not mean that every last detail is drawn, but rather that the essential expressive nature of the pose has been captured.

That essential nature of the pose might be expressed in a 30-second gesture.  The drawing at right happens to be from a 30-minute pose.  The model was kneeling, but what most interested me was her upturned face and her hands behind her back.  I’m happy that the pose was long enough for me to make a good effort at also capturing her likeness.  Of course there are always corrections that can be made, and those are usually noticed the next day after a session.  I’ve been meaning to take a camera so that I would have a reference for a correction here or there, but somehow I have never used a camera for this purpose.  Maybe I’m a snooty purist, thinking that by using a photo, no longer would I be working from a live model.  As a result, I have the occasional uncorrected boo-boo in my work.

It is always a temptation to begin a drawing with too much detail.  The initial layout and the basic shapes need to be laid in fairly quickly.  If I start with detail right off the bat, invariably I will get proportions wrong.  So drawing fast is an imperative.  Most of our poses at Studio b. are between 15 minutes and 45 minutes long.  I remember the studio sessions when I was studying art in college, many moons ago, when we might have had the same pose for the majority of a 3-hour class.  It was always a bit of an ordeal, putting the model in exactly the same position after the breaks, and frankly, the spontaneity disappeared for me.  But back then, the goal was technical accuracy and craftsmanship.

At Studio b. we are fortunate to have models who are invested in our work, who ask what sort of pose we would like, who try very hard to hold difficult poses.  It is an intimate experience, to be working from a model who cares about your success.  I think that can lend an energy to drawing from live models that is absent when I practice from photographs.  The challenge though, is that I have to draw fast, and sometimes that makes me huff and puff and sweat a little!

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

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Props and Themes in Figure Drawing

Our model for Figure Drawing at Studio b. this week brought a black hat that I just loved.  She used it in almost all of the warm-up poses, but then for the longer poses,  she switched to a sequence without the hat.  Fist she posed just standing in the pool, then wetting her hair under one of the pool fountains, and then she posed seated and fixing her hair.

After our break, a few raindrops speckled the courtyard so we moved indoors to one of the galleries for the final poses.

I asked the model to put the hat on for one of the last poses.  It is more interesting to me if there is an element of the drawing that contrasts with the figure.  That element might be an added compositional effect such as the actual setting or environment, or just background shapes, but it could simply be the texture of the model’s hair, or a shadow pattern, or a necklace, or a hairband, or some other inconsequential accessory.  In this case, the hat the model brought was solid black, with a shiny band, and it became a dominant force, giving the pose some pizzazz.

It’s always interesting to see who shows up at Studio b.’s figure drawing sessions.  This week, model and designer India Hicks drew with us.

Studio b. owner Colleen Duffley regularly schedules interesting people to discuss and show their work to the community, and that is how India happened to be in town and to come to figure drawing.  She fussed at her drawings just like the rest of us did, but  I am always amazed at people like her who say they haven’t done any figure drawing in 20 years, and then proceed to whip off some drawings like they never stopped!

I’m going to keep an eye out for her son’s art too.  Though still in junior high, his drawings show great promise.

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

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Drawing a Clothed Model

Figure drawing artists usually work exclusively from nude models.  But this week at Studio b., I had the good fortune of being the only artist.  So I had my choice.  Interestingly, the model had brought tennis gear, and was planning to use it in during the warm-up drawings — he thought we might like the added purposeful action.  So I asked him to wear the tennis clothes and keep the racket nearby for the entire session.

It’s so much easier drawing a clothed model.  I can draw the clothing with an extra wrinkle here or there and no one is the wiser.  You can’t do that with a nude figure without it becoming grotesque.

The model sat for me for 30 minutes for the drawing at left, and we took a short break, and then he sat for me for another 15 minutes.  I like this drawing.  I drew the white with Nupastel and the dark values with graphite, on gray Stonehenge.

The drawings below are two of the warm-up gestures, the second one obviously a longer pose than the first, and the third is the top part of the last drawing of the evening.

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

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Re-Shaping My Life: Art, Fitness, and Play

In the late summer of 2008 I started changing my life.

I had been maintaining a fair level of fitness by jogging, but I stopped when the economy picked up in 2001.  For 7 years then, I made hay while the sun was shining.  My business grew by leaps and bounds.  And I gained an average of 7 pounds a year.  I’m sure some of the weight gain was due to the natural slowing of my metabolism as I slid into middle-age, but I expect the rest was due to the stress.  I was keeping very long hours, working fast and furiously.  In 2007, when the bottom fell out of the economy and my business growth ground to a halt, I discovered that my waistline had grown along with my business.  I pondered whether to just buy new clothes, or to try to do something about it, and I decided to get healthier.  It took me another 6 or 8 months to work up the nerve to go to the local health studio in Seagrove Beach.  I first went there to find out whether Boot Camp would be a place where I would get yelled at, and the owner laughed and said No, so I signed up.  It was slow going.  The instructor would tell the class to do 30 repetitions of some torturous activity, and then she would say, And Joan, you do 5!  I focused on the fact that many of the strong and healthy participants were half my age.  A year and a half later, I traded Boot Camp for Spin, and in the fall of 2010 I was fit enough to do a strenuous hike in Peru.

A year after I started improving my physical fitness, in the fall of 2009, I found out about the figure drawing sessions at Studio b. My major areas of study for my degree from the University of Northern Colorado, some 30 years prior, had been health-physical education-recreation, and also fine arts with a life-drawing emphasis.  I was in heaven when I found out about the local figure drawing sessions.

Now, I am making yet another change, for the fitness of my mind and soul.  I have started practicing meditation, and also have been attending yoga.  I intend to continue both practices, while I keep up with my drawing and my cardio work on the spin-bike.  All the signs that I attach significance to tell me I am on the right path, so even though work is busier, I am making a concerted effort to continue my new, healthier habits.

My art also is ready to progress to the next stage.  Step one is to open the store on my website.  My webmaster, Warren, will be setting it up so that anyone wanting to purchasing one of my drawings can know what my price is, and can actually make the purchase over the internet if they wish.  It will be a little bit grueling, I’m sure, to make sure all of my drawings are correctly identified and reasonably priced.  They will be offered without mat or frame, since matting and framing are very personal choices depending on where the art will be displayed.  Following that, I expect I will be getting out some paints and broadening my artistic efforts by participating in outings with the local plein air painters group.

A dear friend told me today that she had learned to love herself again — maybe that’s what I really had lost and am finding again.  My overall fitness and my art are not the end goal — they are the means.  The end goal is a more playful, creative, expressive, and joyful life.

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

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Plein Air Figure Drawing

At our  Figure Drawing session at Studio b., Thursday this week, we drew in the open air, in the courtyard by the pool.  Studio b. is a wonderful venue for events of all sorts, including many a reception for any number of creative pursuits.  The activity often spills over into the courtyard where the pool and the pool fountain form a serene backdrop to whatever is going on.  A board on two ropes hangs as a swing  in front of the pool, a little catawampus, but serviceable.  The model posed near the old washtubs for our warm-up drawing, and then she posed leaning against one of the arbor pillars, and sitting on the swing, and then lying on a bench.  Four artists enjoyed the evening of shared community and artistic passion, while Colleen Duffley, owner of Studio b., and her assistant worked in the adjoining room.  I drew the following sketches there this week.

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

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Figure Drawing with Graphite-Wash

This past Wednesday during the figure drawing session at Studio b.,  I used conte and nupastel for my warm-up gestures, and graphite, CarbOthello pastels, watercolor pencils, and a graphite wash for my drawings.  I suppose if I stuck to one medium, I would develop more expertise in handling it, but I love making different kinds of marks using different media.

If I am purposefully drawing, then I will slow down and try to be a better craftsman, being more meticulous with whatever medium I have chosen, perhaps even making a few practice drawings of the subject or pose.  But figure drawing almost always demands a hurried pace.

June is the busiest month of the year for my pool service business, so this week I was just using the figure drawing session as a meditative exercise resulting in wonderful stress release.  For 2½ hours, I had no emergencies to respond to, no anxious customers, no mechanical failures to deal with.  Even as difficult as figure drawing is, the process brings on an exhilaration, a euphoria, a feeling of power and connectedness.  I am sure the challenge of the difficulty helps make it  so satisfying, the requirement of absolute concentration and focus.  But mostly it is the sheer joy of expression that I love, the creation of form and feeling through marks on a paper.

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

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Two Steps Forward in Figure Drawing

Click to see much larger image.

I am a better artist.  I drew more like I want to draw, at the weekly figure drawing session at Studio b. last night.  It’s nice to have a night when drawing comes easily.  Well, it’s still work, I have to remember to breathe.  One of the other artists commented that she could hear me taking big breaths — I hope I am not too distracting to the others!

I am powerful.  I attended I Can Do It – Toronto 2011, last weekend.  The conference featured a number of authors published by HayHouse, including Louise Hay herself, Wayne Dyer, Marianne Williamson, and many others.  As is typical for me when I am going away even if for just a few days, I felt compelled to complete all the tasks I had been putting off for months.  So the morning I flew to Toronto, I had gotten only a couple of hours of sleep the night before, which probably made me particularly susceptible to suggestion.  That, in combination with the charismatic, perhaps even hypnotic speakers, left me supremely empowered upon my return.  I am drawing better, and I am guessing the conference is a factor.

We had uninstructed open studio at Studio b. this week, warming up with a number of 1-minute and 2-minute poses, and then some that were a little longer.  We finished with two 25-minute poses and then our last pose was 15 minutes.  My drawing of the last pose is at lower left.  Click on it to see much larger detail.

My drawings were successful not necessarily because of anatomical correctness or portraiture, but because they are believable, effectively communicating what I feel was the essence of the model in her pose at the time that I was drawing her.  In particular, the pose seated on a folding chair caught the complete relaxation of the figure, especially the slight paunch of relaxed stomach muscles.

In the drawing of the clothed model, the portraiture is not a likeness, but I like the textures of pencil strokes and I also like the play of the darks and lights leading the eye through the picture.

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

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Carving the Void: Negative Shapes

The model who posed for our figure drawing session at Studio b. last week returned this week.  For the past four months, we’ve had a different model nearly every session.  That has added to the challenge in that every week we have to become familiar with a different body type or different proportions.  Having the same model two weeks in a row was a luxury.

Our instructor, Heather Clements, provided a focus for us, suggesting that we run the drawing off the page, effectively cropping it in order to create negative shapes out of the negative space.  Often in the rush of trying to get the figure drawn as quickly as possible before the timed pose ends, the background, if treated at all, is merely an afterthought.  By drawing the figure so that parts of it intersect with the edge of the page, it no longer floats on the page, but instead becomes anchored.  The negative space, the space surrounding the figure, is then broken up so that it becomes negative shapes instead of just open space.  Negative shapes help the piece to read as a composition.  Art imitating life, carving the larger voids into smaller pieces makes it more manageable.

A good mat and frame can help with cropping, but it is better for the artist to have made those decisions instead of leaving it up to the framer.

The sketches included here are from this week’s session.

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