THE POWER OF RED!

These are some of the drawings I created last night.  One of the other participants shared with me that she had seen some "Guru" of the New York Art Scene expounding on what sells!  The "expert" said that paintings with RED were the hot ticket.  I was inspired!  Any takers?   As most of you know, I am not very interested in what the latest and greatest is.  I work with images and materials that fire my imagination and get my heart racing.  If you build it, they will come.  Even if  they don't come, I had a good time building it.

The last two figures were short poses.  I work on newsprint.  This time I painted in the mass shapes with acrylic ink and then went back with a fine brush in black ink.  I think this is a good way to capture the gesture, mass and proportion in a short period of time.  I am saving all these quick drawings.  I may try to collage with them at some later date.

3 FOR THE PRICE OF 1!

Tuesday night I went to Palo Alto for the drawing session.  The results can be seen on my Creativity Journey blog.  Last night I went to a drawing session in Sunnyvale.  It was a smaller room with fewer artists but the lighting was more dramatic so better shadow shapes and there were 3 different models, which made it interesting.  None of the models were professional but they did a pretty good job of holding a pose.   I decided to draw as accurately as I could.  If I got a good pose, I could always stylize or simplify it.  The female model was very pretty and slender but her clothing didn't work well for drawing the figure.  It draped oddly around her hips and was difficult to make it "read" properly.  The two guys were beefy and the foreshortened large muscle forms were interesting to draw.  This drawing group will try to meet once a month.

NOT SO MUCH!

Here are a few of the drawings/paintings I did today at the afternoon life drawing session.  It was a loooooooooong pose and difficult to get reved up about.  I played around with different ideas and materials.  I like drawing with the long dropper.  These long poses are too static for me.  I am going to have to find another venue for figure drawing.  Perhaps just sketching in active places.  Fortunately, Tuesday night is dedicated to short poses.  

INSPIRED!

I really liked the model we had last night at the life drawing session.  I like a model with curves or muscles.  Somehow being inspired by the model didn't produce great drawings!!!  This is my favorite for the evening.  Here is the first drawing of this pose where I threw in everything but the kitchen sink, with poor results.  I decided to draw it again keeping things simple.  This drawing was done by drawing with the dropper to the acrylic ink bottle.

Here are some of the other drawings with uneven results.  For the last pose I decided to do blind contour drawing with each liquid acrylic color and then do an accurate drawing on top with ink.  

THE SECOND TIME AROUND!

                                          

I went to a life drawing session tonight, and dragged more supplies with me.  I wanted to try out the oil pastel resist idea.  I found the model very uninspiring and I think the drawings reflect that.  I did have a great time playing with a new combination of materials.  I am liking working with the oil pastels.  I have about 3 sets of very cheap oil pastels.  I decided to use them up before purchasing some quality ones.  They aren't very creamy, to say the least, but they do act as a decent resist.  I posted my favorite first but the correct order starts with the second image.  I put down a red pastel line, then went back with a black ink brush pen.  After that I used some ink washes.

The second painting I decided to use two different colors of resist, then the ink brush pen.  Lastly I added a little blue color along with the ink wash.

Next I decided to put a wet wash of color on the page, let it dry and then did  the brush pen and ink.  Lastly I added the pastel.  I wasn't thrilled with this order of applying the pastel.  

Next, several drawings with different colors of pastel over a washed background, then ink, then I painted stronger color over the body.  Starting to get somewhere here.  

The next idea was to strengthen the color around the body...that is my favorite.

Then I decided to strengthen the color on the body and the outside areas, leaving light forms around the edge of the figure.

The last idea I played with was to use all light pastel lines.  I think I like the more contrasting lines better.

Most of the lines were multiple blind contour drawings of the same pose.