Laurelines

Naked came the strangers

I've been drawing from the (nude) model on and off for a lot of years. Barring the first 4 minutes of my very first attempt, I've approached the subject as if he/she were a still life. Lines, angles, shapes, volumes--these are what count. Of course, some still lifes are spectacularly beautiful (as in the recent case of the Gorgeous Person) but that's beside the point.

Last night, though, after I'd come home from our drawing session, I pinned up these drawings  on my wall and I felt so moved. Here is a person. Here she is, in all her vulnerability. She came to a room of strangers and she took off her clothes. This was trust. This took courage.  And then, I don't know why, I thought of all of the people through time, not just my life, who have done the same and I felt thankful. Humbled, too.

Zinnias, two ways

Zinnias are everywhere this time of year. Me, I grow dahlias, but I got this bouquet yesterday at our local farmers' market.  Using patterned paper for drawing has its hazards , as you can see from the underdrawing at left.  My eyes have not fully recovered from the dizzying mix of background pattern and my drawn lines. Gouache and Micron pen in sienna on imported paper. 

They're different from you and me

When a perfectly gorgeous person enters a room , the atmosphere changes. Her or his physical presence fills the available space with molecules of something--- extra clarity, vividness, I don't know. But it happens. Here's a case in point, our model from last night:

Pose times from upper left to lower right: 30 minutes, 20, 10, 7.

Not your mama's leafy greens

And while these green things may not help, they couldn't hurt, could they?

The age-old question

What in the heck am I doing this (this particular kind of thing--not my art in general) for? I mean, really, a grown woman, playing with weird paper and paint in this (apparently) random way. These are for my green project, which ends in a few days. I wish I could say the paint fumes are getting to me, but this is all water-based.

Left: 'Lady with Flowers,'  c. 1478-80 by  Andrea del Verrochio. Orginal in white marble. I used Sharpie poster paint pen on green paper.

Right: 'Portrait of Mlle Riviere,' c. 1806 by Ingres. Original is oil on canvas. Here I used gouaches and ink on patterned paper.

The Return of the Man with a Beard

I went to a different drawing group last night and....there he was, the mysterious man with a beard. Who he is, where does he come from and what does he know ( and when did he know it?) To be continued.

Not sure why the quick sketch appears so much bigger here than the other two--the images are the same size.  Another mystery amid so many.

Wednesday morning in green and white

Gardenias from the garden, white ink, green paint and a sturdy sketchbook. Who could ask for more?

Portrait of the Artist as a Clumsy Young Potter

First off, don't laugh. Not nice to laugh at children--- or at the childish, either.  Everyday Matters Group weekly drawing challenge was to sketch something we'd made. I made a bust of girl when I was a wee lass of ten. You see the masterpiece in the photo above ( I have very few objects from my childhood. Three moves is as good as a fire and we moved a lot.  Father in Air Force.) One of our online group introduced us to a  free downloadable computer graphics  program called Artrage and I wanted to try it. So I did the sketch of Woman in White as you see----my first piece of Computer Art! (ironic use of italics and capital letters, you all.)  So, I'm ten again, doing as I did again, singing a song... . If you can't make a fool of yourself in front of the whole world,  just who CAN you make a fool of yourself in front of?

And now for something a little different

Who knows why we do the things we do? Here's a sketch of Andrea Di Niccolo's 'Faith' (ca. 1495-1500, tempera on panel), a photograph of which appeared in  the March 2005 issue of  ARTnews.  For this I used pen and gouache on patterned paper. How easily I'm amused.

A Moveable Feast

I don't know where my fellow citizens of the college town we inhabit were yesterday morning, but they sure weren't in cafes. I went looking and all I got was one studious woman and a couple of dirty looks from a man who was NOT happy when my sketching eyes turned his way. There was nothing for it but to wait 'til the cocktail hour and head for a bar. Which is what I did. I ordered a Hurricane (tall glass of icy rum and clementine) just so I'd fit in---oh, the art life is a life full of sacrifice.