Expressive Drawing – Equilibrium

Walking the Dog
Expressive Drawing - Chapter 8 - Play 1
Ink on Rice Paper
40.5cm x 20.5cm (16" x 8")

In Chapter 8 of Expressive Drawing, Steven Aimone identifies the importance of equilibrium or balance in nature and suggests a drawing incorporating a sense of equilibrium, speaks poetically about nature and life.

Related Drawings - Asymmetrical
Expressive Drawing - Chapter 8 - Build 1
Graphite and Charcoal on Paper
59.4cm x 84.1cm (23.4" x 33.1")

Steven defines equilibrium as the unity that occurs when opposites or polarities come together like yin and yang. He identifies examples of different types of polarities such as night and day, hot and cold, wet and dry, pain and pleasure, hope and fear, love and hate, light and dark, active and passive, rough and smooth, top and bottom, inside and outside, front and back, left and right, and so on. He explains that equilibrium provides a feeling of stability and is usually a desirable and necessary thing, but sometimes instability gives a sense of life, excitement and tension.

Related Drawings - Symmetrical
Expressive Drawing - Chapter 8 - Build 1
Graphite and Charcoal on Paper
59.4cm x 84.1cm (23.4" x 33.1")

The play exercise for the chapter involves creating drawings with left and right balance without resorting to symmetry. The build exercise entails creating a pair of related drawings. They both have a sense of equilibrium, but one of them is almost perfectly symmetrical and the other is asymmetrical.

Flying a Kite
Expressive Drawing - Chapter 8 - Play 1
Ink on Rice Paper
40.5cm x 20.5cm (16" x 8")

I still haven't got back into the swing of these exercises, but I am persevering, trying to absorb the ideas, and trusting I will be inspired by some of the later chapters.

Drawing and Painting the Landscape – Measured Drawing

View Towards Gatcombe Farm
Measured Drawing - Drawing and Painting the Landscape
April 2019
Ink
Stillman & Birn Alpha Series Sketchbook
21.5cm x 18.5cm (8.5" x 7.25")

In Lesson 5 of Drawing and Painting the Landscape, Philip Tyler introduces some techniques to accurately draw a picture to scale based on sight measuring and angle checking. This involves adopting the stereotypical pose of the artist using a pencil in an outstretched arm to estimate the relative size of objects, measure angles and to check alignments.

The approach is similar to those explained in other sources including The Urban Sketcher by Marc Taro Holmes (Citizen Sketcher) and Liz Steel's SketchingNow Foundations course. This isn't surprising because there are a limited number of ways to address the challenge of translating a three-dimensional landscape into an accurate two-dimensional drawing.

Philip includes an interesting discussion about how much of the landscape we can see without turning our head. This knowledge can help us to tackle our tendency to include too wide a field of view in our drawings and to simultaneously draw everything too big.

Edge of the Common
Measured Drawing - Drawing and Painting the Landscape
April 2019
Ink
Stillman & Birn Alpha Series Sketchbook
16.5cm x 12.5.5cm (6.5" x 5")

The exercise also includes the seemingly unrelated concept of decorative line drawings in which the confidence and fluidity of the line work is as important as the subject:

... the objects in the landscape become a series of shapes that are defined largely by an unwavering line. There is a real confidence to the line, finding the rhythms and repetitions of motif within the landscape.

Otter Estuary - Decorative Line
Measured Drawing - Drawing and Painting the Landscape
April 2019
Ink on Paper
19.5cm x 15cm (7.5" x 6")

The picture of the Otter Estuary is a decorative line drawing using a photograph as a reference. The other pictures were drawn from life, first focusing on accurate measurement and then trying to create decorative lines.

From the Bench on Fewster Road
Measured Drawing - Drawing and Painting the Landscape
April 2019
Ink
Stillman & Birn Alpha Series Sketchbook
12.5cm x 16.5cm (5" x 6.5")

I had the usual apprehensions about drawing in public, but there really doesn’t seem much to worry about. I take care to position myself as out of the way as possible. If anyone notices what I am up to, they are usually too timid to disturb my fierce concentration. If they miss (or ignore) the signs that I don’t want to be interrupted, they only want to look at the drawing and to pass the time of day. In common with most sketchers, I haven’t encountered anything except pleasantness and compliments.

Keys to Drawing with Imagination – Macro Drawing

Walnuts Are Brain Food
Macro Drawing
Keys to Drawing with Imagination
Graphite Pencil on Paper
Stillman & Birn Alpha Series Sketchbook
14.0cm x 20.3cm (5.5" x 8.0")

The objective of Exercise 11 from Keys to Drawing with Imagination by Bert Dodson is to make an enlarged image of a small object or creature using a good magnifying glass. Bert observes:

Enlarging an object transforms it. It reveals a level of structure and detail that is otherwise invisible to us.

This was a challenge because my magnifying glass is not good. It provides a small distorted field of view with minimal magnification – frankly, I would be better off squinting at the subject. I am also struggling to get back into the swing of modelling with pencil (see Keys to Drawing with Imagination – Creating Destruction). I’m persevering because this is a core skill I want to cultivate.

Keys to Drawing with Imagination – Creating Destruction

Brown Bag Lunch
Creating Destruction
Keys to Drawing with Imagination
Graphite Pencil on Paper
Stillman & Birn Alpha Series Sketchbook
14.0cm x 20.3cm (5.5" x 8.0")

Exercise 9 of Keys to Drawing with Imagination is about drawing things that are crumpled, dented or crushed. Bert observes there is something aesthetically pleasing about the partially destroyed.

This is my third go at drawing a crumpled bag. I seem to have forgotten everything I knew about drawing and rendering shadow shapes. I will persevere with this sort of drawing with pencil and pen over the next few weeks. I need to get back into the practice of first analysing and outlining the shadow pattern and then becoming absorbed in rendering it.

Drawing and Painting the Landscape – Partial Peek

Coaley Peak
Partial Peek - Drawing and Painting the Landscape
Ink and Gouache
Stillman & Birn Alpha Series Sketchbook
30.5cm x 21.5cm (12" x 8.5")

Partial peek is the subject of Lesson 4 in Drawing and Painting the Landscape by Philip Tyler . It is the next step after blind drawing (see Drawing and Painting the Landscape - Blind Drawing). The aim is still to spend more time looking at the landscape then your sketchbook. You blind draw as much as possible, but take occasional peeks at the paper to ensure your lines are not too far out of whack.

Clouds in the Valley and Ivy Clad Oak Trees
Partial Peek - Drawing and Painting the Landscape
Ink and Gouache
Stillman & Birn Alpha Series Sketchbook
21.5cm x 30.5cm (8.5" x 12")

Philip observes that some elements of the landscape lend themselves more to blind drawing than others - he suggests trees and rolling hills. Liz Steel makes a similar observation in her SketchingNow Foundations course.

Draw the foliage loosely, almost blind without worrying if the tree gets out of control a little.

I think blind drawing works best when a descriptive edge is more important than pinpoint accuracy.

Otter Estuary and Mon & Brec
Partial Peek - Drawing and Painting the Landscape
Ink and Gouache
Stillman & Birn Alpha Series Sketchbook
21.5cm x 30.5cm (8.5" x 12")

I drew a few partial peeks from photographs and one in situ at Coaley Peak - this is just along the Cotswold Way from Selsley Common (where the sketchbook was blown out of my hand during the Blind Drawing exercise). Coaley Peak is normally even windier than Selsley common, but this time the weather was kinder.

Expressive Drawing – Rhythm

Rhythmic Drawing with Several Motifs
Expressive Drawing - Chapter 7 - Build 3
Digital

In Chapter 7 of Expressive Drawing, Steven Aimone discusses Rhythm. He observes there is a rhythm in all living things and suggests if a drawing displays rhythm, it can be experienced as being about nature or life itself. I agree that there is something primal about a drawing with a strong rhythmic component.

Rhythmic Repetition
Expressive Drawing - Chapter 7 - Play 1
Graphite on Paper
84.1cm x 20cm (33.1" x 8")

The initial play exercises concern creating long thin drawings based on the rhythmic repetition of vertical lines.

Horizontal Rhythm of a Vertical Line Bar Motif
Expressive Drawing - Chapter 7 - Build 1
Acrylic on Paper
84.1cm x 59.4cm (33.1" x 23.4")

The first build exercise is also about the rhythmic repetition of vertical lines. The instructions for the exercise are like those for previous exercises - you add elements to the drawing and remove anything you don’t like by erasing or obscuring it.

I had a major loss of mojo during this exercise. The drawing quickly reached a point where both Elaine and I were enthusiastic about it. Elaine even talked about framing it. I decided to do one more thing, which spoilt the composition and then spent weeks adding bits on and covering bits up - never finding a pattern I enjoyed. Part of the problem is once lines have been erased or obscured, the drawing begins to look overworked. The white acrylic I use intensifies the problem because it's not a pure white - it has a slight creamy yellow cast. My loss of confidence and enthusiasm was also due to a lack of time for drawing and painting.

Rhythmic Drawing with Several Motifs
Expressive Drawing - Chapter 7 - Build 3
Charcoal on Paper
59.4cm x 84.1cm (23.4" x 33.1")

I began to get things back together on the final build exercise - creating a rhythmic drawing with several motifs. I wanted to draw it again and refine it. For a change, I decided to do this in GIMP a free alternative to Photoshop.

Drawing and Painting the Landscape – Blind Drawing

Otter Estuary
Blind Drawing
Drawing and Painting the Landscape
February 2019
Ink
Stillman & Birn Alpha Series Sketchbook
20cm x 11cm (8" x 4.25")

Lesson 3 of Drawing and Painting the Landscape by Philip Tyler is Blind Drawing (a.k.a. Blind Contour Drawing). Most drawing courses and books include blind drawing in one form or another. See the contour drawing label for posts about contour drawing and blind drawing from:

• The Natural Way to Draw
• Keys to Drawing
• Liz Steel’s SketchingNow Foundations course
• Adebanji Alade’s Inspired to Sketch blog

The aim of the exercise is to study the subject intently. You draw while looking at the subject, you don't look at the paper until the drawing is complete. I particularly like Kimon Nicolaїdes instructions from The Natural Way to Draw:

Imagine that your pencil point is touching the model instead of the paper. Without taking your eyes off the model, wait until you are convinced that the pencil is touching that point on the model upon which your eyes are fastened. Then move your eyes slowly along the contour of the model and move the pencil slowly along the paper. As you do this, keep the conviction that the pencil point is actually touching the contour. Be guided more by the sense of touch than by sight.

Langdale Hills
Blind Drawing
Drawing and Painting the Landscape
February 2019
Graphite Pencil
Stillman & Birn Alpha Series Sketchbook
29cm x 15cm (11.5" x 6")

Philip Tyler recommends the exercise as a technique for warming up:

To find a way of getting into the landscape to discover how it might be drawn.

I drew a few blind drawings from photographs and one in situ on Selsley common. The common is on the edge of the Cotswolds with views over the Severn estuary stretching as far as the Brecon Beacons and the Malvern Hills. It is almost always blustery on the common, probably because the valley acts like a wind tunnel. Elaine and I were there walking with Doris on a particularly windy day. I took a few minutes to sit on a bench and draw the view of Pen Hill. The exercise reached a natural conclusion when the wind abruptly ripped the sketchbook out of my hands and deposited it a few feet away.

Pen Hill from Selsley Common
Blind Drawing
Drawing and Painting the Landscape
February 2019
Graphite Pencil
Stillman & Birn Alpha Series Sketchbook
20cm x 18cm (8" x 7")

I enjoy blind drawing and always get enthralled by the exercise, but my drawings never look anything like the thing the subject. While drawing Pen Hill I realised part of the problem is I normally place the paper to my side - outside of my field of vision. The contortion on my arm makes it difficult for my hand to track accurately; which results in a wonky sketch. It doesn't really matter because the objective of the exercise is to study the subject intently - not to produce a master drawing, but I would still prefer the results to be slightly more accurate. Philip suggests using the cover of the sketchbook over your hand, so that you cannot accidentally look at the drawing. Something I will do from now on.