Part Two: Observation in nature

Project: Still Life

This still life drawing of natural objects was done for the previous section. I have shown it again here as a starting point for this next section.

The following work explores ways of drawing natural objects....

Drawing in dots and squiggles

  

Exercise: Still life line drawing

Exercise: Still life group in tone

                     

Project: Drawing fruit and vegetables

Exercise: Using hatching to create tone

Comment  I find soft pastels the easiest colour medium for drawing. One can manipulate, blend, overdraw and correct. It's good for large sweeping strokes covering big colour areas but also can be used for details especially with pastel pencils or the harder conte type. It can also be used with turpentine as a solvent to get painterly effects.On the negative side the colours can be a bit dull if overworked or if the quality is not the best. Also the work tends to be predictable and does not lend itself to the 'happy accidents' that can enliven works in ink or other liquid medium.

Exercise: Using pen and ink

Comment  I have done very little work in ink and am new to coloured inks but I am quite excited by this  medium. The colours are really bright and glowing and can be used in different ways... line, splashes, painted areas etc. I am still learning how to exploit the qualities of ink and have bought a set of dip pens to experiment.

Exercise: Using oil pastels

Comment I had previously tried to use oil pastels but found them very rough and difficult to use. However I have since learnt how to use solvents and more suitable paper and am very pleased with the bright colours that are produced and the effects that can be achieved by combining colours in different ways. On the downside there is a limit on adding layers as the surface gets too smooth and without a 'tooth' the pigment doesn't stick, also oil pastels are not great for fine detail. 

Project : Drawing Plants and Flowers

 

Pencil drawing

 

Using coloured pencils

Comment  Colour pencils can produce drawings of great delicacy but I find that doing large drawings with this medium can be very time consuming and even tedious. I spent hours on this drawing and the final results are not that great. In particular I found it difficult to get good light and dark contrasts. However, for small detailed drawings colour pencils could be a great solution.

Drawing with other media  (soft pastel and ink)

Project: Drawing Animals

Exercise: Grabbing the moment

                                                                                                                                      

               

Comment  I did these charcoal sketches at a local farm zoo in Edinburgh. I like drawing animals and charcoal is one of my favourite mediums so this exercise was very enjoyable.  

 Drawing in water soluble pencils

 Comment   I enjoyed this assignment. Water soluble pencils are a great medium for small drawings like this. Subtle effects can be produced by adding water and are used here to show the incremental colour changes on the fish.

Assignment Two   

First step -  Deciding on the composition.

I experimented with some fruit and flowers to find an arrangement that felt right and then did a preliminary sketch with pastels.

This first sketch gave the impression that the arrangement was a bit squashed so I tried again with a portrait format.

Second sketch

This worked better but I felt the plant and the pineapple combined was too much so decided to replace the plant with a bottle.

Assignment Two Drawing

 I first painted the basic layout in acrylic over paper that had been primed with gesso.  This was quite a good idea because it was easy to amend the composition until it felt right. When I was satisfied with the arrangement I drew into the painting with oil pastels. I am relatively pleased with the outcome but I spent far too long on it and got overly caught up in the detail.
                   

Assignment Two

Overall Summary   I generally enjoy still life but I found the exercises in this section too prescribed and the requirements didn't leave enough decision making to the student. I would have liked more encouragement to use my creative imagination. I have done a lot of rather conventional of still life drawing before so the subject matter wasn't new. In retrospect I should not have followed the instructions so rigorously and should have tried some more contemporary and adventurous interpretations of the subject matter. I will try to do this in the next section.