Paper and Threads

I went back to the Museum of Modern Art Toulouse-Lautrec Drawing Session again this week and these are 3 of the drawings I did.  The entire 90 minute session is tightly structured and we move from contour, to blind contour, to gesture, to moving gestures, and then some still poses.  These are poses of about 5 minutes duration - each with some change of props to create a café performer atmosphere.  The model is one of the actresses I sketched there before.

The drawings were done with a soluble graphite pencil and a waterbrush, and then photographed because of size. 

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Pat, Benedicte and I saw our second Bill Traylor exhibit last Friday.  The New York Folk Art Museum had an exhibit in 2013 and Betty Cunningham Gallery just had an exhibit.  We made it down to the Lower Eastside one day before it closed! 

Bill was born a slave on George Traylor's plantation, and continued to work there after he was emancipated.  At age 74 he moved to Montgomery Alabama and soon was homeless.  Charles Shannon, a young artist, met Traylor at age 85, sitting in front of a blacksmith shop drawing with a pencil stub.  He provided Traylor with art supplies for the next 3 years and bought over 1200 drawings from him.  This exhibit was from the Shannon Collection.

His drawings are owned by many major museums and I made a composite drawing of images I liked at both exhibits. 

2013: 

2014:

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I made a book of my figure drawings for my end of semester FIT bookbinding project and will present it to the class tomorrow evening.  The Museum of Modern Art currently has a Toulouse-Lautrec Print exhibit and I sketched a figure from one of his prints during my first visit.  That drawing became the illustration that is embedded in my book cover.  The book cloth is hand-dyed fabric that I made.

The book is 24 pages long and contains a mixture of Toulouse-Lautrec quotes and 14 of my drawings.  The drawings were done during two MoMA drawing sessions during which actress models were dressed in café society clothes with props  Each session was 90 minutes and each of these drawings were not much more than 5 minute poses. 

The session started with an introduction to Toulouse-Lautrec and a combination of contour drawings and gesture drawings for warm up.  After each of the 5 minute poses, the museum educator walked around with a few of our drawings and made comments.  I already posted some of my drawings from the first drawing session.  These are from the second session. 

I'm thrilled with my book and the Basic Bookbinding class that I took this semester.  I was a self-taught bookbinder and learned so many tips from a professional. 

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Pat, Benedicte and I went to Chelsea on Wednesday to see more art exhibits, including two Picasso exhibits.  Pace Gallery had more of Picasso and Jacqueline art, in addition to other pieces.  I sketched there and added paint at home.  The two Pace Picasso exhibits were extraordinary!  So glad I was able to see both of them.

Picasso used Delacroix's Women of Algiers painting for inspiration and created several paintings based on the Delacroix.  This was a small painting, but wonderfully complex and colorful.

I loved the position of the naked woman on the floor, but mangled her legs while sketching her.     

We also went to the Gagosian exhibit:  Picasso and the Camera.  They are a very different type of gallery.  They took our bags away from us as soon as we arrived.  And when I made a mark on the press release copy they were distributing, a guard pounced on me within 5 seconds and told me "no sketching allowed."  We later questioned the staff and learned that IPads were allowed for drawing.  There was one simple nude painting we liked and Pat made a quick sketch on her iPad and then found the image online.  This is her!

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This is Picasso month for me - one of my favorite artists because of his line - and obviously his amazing creativity and range.  I spent all day Monday at the Metropolitan Museum of Art with my friends Benedicte, Pat, and Teri, seeing 4 new exhibits, and we started with the Lauder Cubism exhibit.  It was amazing!  And the cards beside each piece were extremely educational.  I loved this piece and sketched it in the exhibit - adding paint at home.

Yesterday Pat, Benedicte. and I met at Pace Gallery on E. 57th St for the Picasso and Jacqueline exhibit - before we went gallery-hopping and eventually spent the afternoon at the Toulouse-Lautrec-inspired Figure Drawing session.  I chose 2 Picasso linocuts of Jacqueline to draw, because of the lines.

Today we are going to Chelsea to continue our Gallery visits, beginning with the 2 new Picasso exhibits there.  New York City has so many art exhibits and activities this month - into January - that it would be possible to schedule wonderful activities everyday.  But I have too much sewing to do for our family Christmas ornaments, presents etc,  that choices must be made! 

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