Paper and Threads

I am slowly working my way through the Dodson Keys to Drawing book projects.  I have two more projects in Chapter 3 and five more chapters total.

I posted Project 3A - Standing Figure - in January. 

Project 3B is to draw a lounging figure.  I used a photo from my book The Nude Figure by Mark Edward Smith. 

Project 3C is to draw a reclining figure (foreshortened).  I used another photo from my book The Nude Figure by Mark Edward Smith. 

Project 3D is to draw a full face portrait.  I used a photo of Obama and practiced using a grid system.  The drawing can be seen here.

Project 3E is to draw a three-quarter view portrait.  I used a photo from morguefile.com.

Although there is a section on drawing profiles, there is no project for drawing a profile in the book.  But I decided that I needed the practice.  I used a photo from morguefile.com. 

Posted by Shirley at 4:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

I love the drawings of Agnolo Bronzino (1503-1572) and today joined my friend Melly at the Metropolitan Museum of Art to draw some of them for the second time.  My first drawings were posted here.  The exhibit ends April 18th. so I will even have time to return for more.  All of the drawings were done with a Caran d'Ache aquarelle pencil (Mahogany).

 Study for his painting Jealousy - and for me More Hand Drawing Practice:

Head of a Young Woman - and for me the challenge was getting the correct angle for the head: 

Study of Crossed Legs - and for me lots of crosshatching for shading

Posted by Shirley at 9:07 PM | Permalink | Comments (9)

Last night was my monthly session at figure drawing.  Since they are held twice each week, I can usually find at least one night to go each month.  The format remains the same - two models in ten 2 minute poses, four 5 minute poses, two 10 minute poses, and three 20 minute poses while sketching with wine and live jazz.  I sat in a different area of the room last night and wrestled with the angle during most of the 2 minute poses.  Here are a few from the 5, 10, and 20 minute poses.  I'm still sketching with plain graphite.

5 minutes:

5 Minutes:

10 Minutes:

20 Minutes:

20 Minutes:

Posted by Shirley at 8:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (8)

 We took our 6 year old grandson Henry to the 3rd Young People's Concert in this year's series at the New York Philharmonic and a fabulous Spanish guitarist was the soloist with the orchestra.  We were sitting too far away for me to see his hands, so I sketched him from one of his website photos for my daily sketch.  His hands really were in that position, but it reminded me that I need lots more practice drawing hands.  I am slowly drawing each letter from photos on an American Sign Language website and I decided that it was time for J and K.  Pablo Saenz Villegas was drawn with my water-soluble Pilot Varsity pen and then brushed with water.

American Sign Language letters - drawn with a watercolor pencil from photos on a website.

Posted by Shirley at 10:59 AM | Permalink | Comments (10)

I love watching the Winter Olympics and spent large blocks of time glued to the coverage.  Probably because of my lifelong interest in dance, and specifically ballet, figure skating is one of my very favorite events.  As I was getting ready to watch the Women's Short Program, I was surfing the NBC Olympic website and found this photo of Mirai Nagasu.  I fell in love with this perky, skilled, 16 year old while watching her skate at Nationals several weeks before.  Although she was being considered the US hope for the future, she appeared to be in a group with other world class skaters already.  I loved the entire coverage of the Women's event and have never been so impressed as I was with Kim Yu-Na's free skate on Thursday evening.  But I was even more thrilled that Mirai finished in 4th place!!   

Posted by Shirley at 9:01 AM | Permalink | Comments (10)