Pointed Remarks!

Some of the most difficult things to draw accurately are objects which are essentially symetrical,  things like cars, - especially when, as I do here, you draw without preparatory measures or pencil  under-drawing.  In these drawings I used a favorite pen, the Staedtler Pigment Liner, a lightfast, waterproof, smooth fine-line pen. You can see I had more time to draw the autos in the top piece, - less in the second and much less in the bottom drawing.  In all, tho', there's some illusion of "depth".

Here in these drawings, I found it best to start with those objects and parts closest, then work back into the picture toward the background.  Over lapping and relative size help produce an illusion of depth, so a small understanding of "Linear Perspective" is helpful. While drawing an object in perspective it is easy to misinterpret line direction and introduce unwanted distortion unless you have a clear idea about the location of your eye level (horizon line) vs. your subject matter.  That is key!

Think in terms of water for a moment. Imagine you are seated on your dandy little folding stool, nice new pen in hand, drawing the stationwagon on the left. A water main breaks and  you are sitting there with water right up to your eyes! Being a patient person, you wait to see what happens next. Eventually the water drains away and you can see a "high water mark" on everything in sight.  That would be your eye level!

Lines of the objects running away from you, above your eye level  (like roof-lines of the cars) run down toward your eye level.  Lines running away from you, below eye level (Perhaps the automobile rocker panels) run up toward your eye level.  Check the right side of that station-wagon, - roof lines, window lines, trim lines, rocker panels, etc. - lines parallel to the ground and parallel to each other.  If these lines were extended out toward the background, they'd meet at essentially the same point, a "Vanishing Point", at your eye level.  Keeping all that in mind while drawing will help you to "construct" believable objects and show depth in your drawing.

Just for fun, find magazine photos of cars, or perhaps better in this case, architecture.  With a ruler, draw lines along window, roof and trim lines.  Extend them out 'til they meet. Now draw a horizontal line through that point. That's the actual camera lens level and "horizon" line.  If you are the camera, - that's your eye level.

Get the Point?   OK, - Now, get out of those wet clothes and draw!

Perspecti is to painting what the bridle is to the horse, the rudder to a ship." Leonardo DaVinci

Jade & Fruit

Let me remind you again of the opportunities for simple subject matter in ordinary household "stuff".  Generally speaking, I choose simple things to draw and emphasize form by observing and reproducing light and shade on the object. If these works, especially that of the fruit, were in black & white with no color, we'd still see form. 

Now, let me play teacher for a moment. (Those of you who are experienced artists, close your eyes!)  Overlapping elements, like the leaves on the left, help us to see "depth" in a work. Our life experience is that an object in front is closer, a partially hidden thing is further away.  Picture two simple squares overlapped.

Another, very important contributor to the 3-dimentional quality of these drawings is Color!   Aside from overlapping, the green leaves come forward of the blue and grey background because of the warm yellow in the green.  The green is much warmer than those blues. 

The same deal in the pear/apple piece, the reds and oranges, very warm colors, quite emphatically push forward of the dull grey background.  Even in comparison to the cool greens and blues of the jade plant above, the fruit drawing stands out as closer!

The warm reds & oranges in the lower drawing are highly saturated compared to the green in the jade plant. When I laid down the reds with my pencils, I pressed down a bit harder, depositing more pigment, covering the grey paper completely so that no grey showed through the reds. Otherwise we would have seen the dull grey mixed with the reds, dulling or neutralizing the red, pushing it back.

BTW,  In each of the works above   I've made use of "analogous" color schemes,  colors next to each other on the color wheel.   - Blue/green in one,  red/orange in the other. Analogous colors work well together, they are harmonious.  The  quote below by Marc Chagall says it very well. 

There's another color "thing" at work here, - not in the drawings but on the page!  Red and Green are opposites on the color wheel.  We call them complementary colors.  When put near to each other, complements seem to brighten each other.  Just viewing these two drawings close to each other as they are, makes both seem more alive. (In some cases that effect is even stronger and the colors actually seem to vibrate!)  If I had drawn green pears and apples, this page would have been much less interesting!  Try this: scroll this post so that you can see both drawings at once, then with your hand cover each alternately.  See how much more lively the whole page is with both in view?  The power of complements!  The use of complements within an art work livens it up, - can make it more exciting!

OK, I'm done! Next time I'll try to lecture less.  You there, with your eyes closed, - Wake Up! 

"All colors are the friends of their neighbors and the lovers of their opposites." Marc Chagall

 

Vacation Days

 I don't often have time to make detailed drawings like this when away from home but every once in a while the true meaning of "vacation" slips into my mind, hands me a pen and slows the clock while I record a summery view. Here's an early morning look out a third floor back window of the two hundred year old "Red Lion Inn" of western Massachusetts,  - a delightful old fashioned hotel with antique furnishings, a great New England menu and vintage village views.

The second drawing, this time with ball-point pen, is a narrow vista from my favorite vacation spot at home in up-state New York.  Here I can enjoy a beautiful summer afternoon recording the skyward view to the south. That spot is our lovely back deck, almost a tree house under a huge old maple, so that patch of sky and the leafy green bower above is the ceiling of this my "favorite room". - Another great vacation spot!


As you can see, a fine ball-point pen produces a softer mark, more like that of a  pencil than the crisp ink line of the first drawing. It's ALL good though. A slow vacation day or two minute parking lot drawing, putting time in your sketchbook everywhere you go is the best medicine for boredom and certainly the best practice for the health of your artistic life.




The quality of life is determined by its activities. (Aristotle)
Throw open your window and let the scenery of clouds and sky enter your room! (Yosa Buson) 

About Accuracy

Every once in a while I'll set up a problem for myself,  - a  quick still life of sorts, - something different from the usual figures and organic forms which I've shown previously.  Here I've scattered a bunch of paint tubes in such a way that we see some in profile, others in end views, most all obliquely.  If total accuracy were my primary concern I might have resorted to linear perspective, a technical method of constructing and depicting 3-dimensional forms on a 2-dimensional surface, but that would take more time and effort than I'm willing to expend on a sketch.  Even tho' I say looking and seeing are very important, knowledge is power!   It does help to understand the rules of 2 & 3 point-perspective, so given a problem of this sort we can interpret what is seen more easily by keeping in mind the rules of perspective.   


Aside from perspective, one of the things I pay particular attention to is "negative space", the spaces between the objects. While looking at shapes of the objects themselves, observing the shapes of the spaces carefully helps over all accuracy. 

In the end, I love drawing without any intervention;  putting the pen directly to paper is a real challenge.   I accept the natural distortions resulting and enjoy the "hand-made" qualities of the final product.  For me there is so much more "life" in a drawing that looks as if a human hand did the work.  Don't get me wrong, there is nothing wrong with accurate drawing.  A fine, beautifully rendered drawing is a joy to behold but if it truly looks like a photograph, why not use a camera?