Drawing Room: Sketchbook

My Sketchbook

Some of the figure drawings here date back to January, but they weren't handed in at midterm. So I will be sharing them now.

The bulk of my sketchbook is made up of figure drawings - lots of gestures and some contour drawings as well. My focus for the last year has been learning to draw the figure. It's such a complex topic, and there's so much to learn! Most of these come from live figure drawing sessions, but when that's not an option I will use online photo repositories as well.

Right now I think my biggest weakness - though certainly not my only one - is my ability to think in and convey ideas with tone. In general, I'm more happy with the line/shape drawings than with the tone/form ones.

I've tried to upload them in roughly chronological order.

Before you say it: Her feet are huge because the model came in wearing big old hobbit feet slippers. Which was hilarious and a lot of fun but it turned out looking like I screwed up with foreshortening. Which also might be true.

Artist Studies

Since the university is shut down, I don't have access to a printer. As such, my artist studies can't be put directly into my sketchbook. Instead, I'll be uploading them here.

Miss Jisu

Jisu Kim, AKA Miss Jisu, is a korean artist. She studied under Kim Jung Gi, and works primarily in ink and watercolor. She mostly draws female characters. All these images come from her instagram, which can be found here.

A lot of my own motivation for drawing comes from cartoons. Animation has always been one of my biggest influences and inspirations throughout my art “career.” Perhaps this is why I value simplicity in art so much – the ability to say (or show) the most using the least is something I’ve always respected.

https://www.instagram.com/p/B9FKUVhhlA6/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link

See here the stark contrast between the level of detail on the figure and skeleton versus the background! The character almost dissolves the distinction between positive and negative space because of her simplicity. Detail draws the eye, but contrast creates interest – so despite the detailed background, I want to keep looking at the character and the skeleton.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BvUHFM-AIRt/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link

Of course, Miss Jisu is certainly far from incapable of using detail, contour, and tone to their full advantage. Works like this demonstrate her masterful skills with brush and ink.

https://www.instagram.com/p/B73uZhwhBJh/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link

This, I think, is where I can learn the most from Miss Jisu. One of my biggest weaknesses – especially in figure drawing – is my ability to use tone effectively. While I am naturally drawn to those drawings which are very simple, if I am to do those kinds of drawings it should not be because I am unable to do otherwise.

https://www.instagram.com/p/B7ioku5BDEz/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link

Her instagram is filled with these whiteboard anatomy studies. Wow!

https://www.instagram.com/p/BaJSocVD1Je/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link

https://www.instagram.com/p/ByPxTbtBtlX/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link

Andrey Samarin

Andrew Samarin is a Russian artist who does absolutely impeccable figure drawings, typically in graphite. I pulled these images from his Reddit account.

If I could choose to draw like any other artist, I would choose Andrey. These are GORGEOUS. Look at how he manages to capture all these individual planes in this hand. There's a very strong understanding of anatomy here, but also some brilliant shape design and wonderful use of cross-contour.

Hand, 2019

In fact, Andrey's use of cross-contour to simultaneously indicate form and tone is one of my favorite things about his works!

Heart, 2019

But another thing to look at is how he uses rhythms in his gestures. I've done a lot of gesture drawings over the last year but I'm still struggling with this idea of rhythm: using lines of action to move from one part of the pose to the other.

She's Like a Wind, 2018

The last thing I want to point out is how he's selective about where he puts his detail. See how he chooses one part of the body to really focus on, and is content to leave the rest as a silhouette that fades into the background.

Stature, 2018

Torso, 2018

But figure drawing isn't just about human figures, is it? The same techniques can be used for just about any subject. For example, this elephant.

Elephant, 2018

Deborah Brown

Deborah Brown is an American painter. You can view her online portfolio here.

Of all the artists I've studied this semester, Deborah Brown might be my favorite. What I adore about Deborah's work is that it's a beautiful feminist subversion of the history of male dominance in art. I'm sure you all know about the "male gaze," the idea that men exert power over women by the mere act of looking. This manifests in artwork as the tendency to use the female body as the ideal form of beauty, and the goal of the male is often to possess that beauty.

It also manifests in narratives with the idea that "women are, men do." In art and narrative, women embody ideals: beauty, virtue, love, or more sinister concepts like otherness and strangeness. Men, on the other hand, embody action. In most classical narratives, men are the heroes. They're the ones who answer the call.

Deborah Brown subverts these ideas by reclaiming the female nude as a symbol of both power and vulnerability, and then portrays these women as the heroes of their stories. Her paintings hearken back to classical greek and roman narratives which were male-dominiated, but there's no men to be seen. Her works show women as powerful figures who act despite their vulnerability.

And if that weren't enough, they're damn pretty paintings to boot.

Danae and Zeus, 2017

Diana and Actaeon 3, 2018

Judith 2, 2018

Stream, 2018

Her earlier works had not quite developed these themes yet. But they have some very interesting genre-bending compositions here. Earlier in the semester I spend a lot of time studying the Cubists such as Picasso and Gris. It's not difficult to see the cubist influence in her earlier work. The figures in the following painting could have been lifted straight from Picasso's work, but the ground they're situated in is much more impressionistic in nature.