Art course in Paris (2014)→ Week 3

This week was all about tonality, i.e. how dark and light things are. For this we learnt more about action of light and how it helps in revealing nature’s designs. Light changes the way we see a form. It creates dark areas, light areas and reflections.

To know how light or dark an area is we examine its:

1. Planar orientation — planar orientation of a form is useful in knowing which planes would be lit more than the others
2. Proximity to light — by knowing how close or far we are from the source of light we can determine the degree of brightness or darkness.

Let us examine that using a sphere

For a sphere, the value progression from terminator line to the brightest bright is the same in all directions and it changes at a constant rate. Unlike a sphere, the planes on a body do not all receive equal light. Even the value progression is not constant.

Next were reflected light and highlight planes. Highlight plane changes with our line of sight because it is with respect to a viewer.

Next week, we studied more about the modeling of a form.

Art course in Paris (2014)→ Week 4

"Drawing by Timothy Stotz"

Last week we studied tonality using a sphere. This week was about modeling a form. Our body is not a sphere and has lot of irregular shapes. Tim taught us how to think about broad forms for shadows and to look for terminators. The value for each part has to be compared to the value of another form, i.e. we learnt to observe how dark or light one form was compared to other.

We start by looking for planar division of masses and then planar division of shadows. Look for cast shadow, and form shadow. Shadows always cut across a form and are defined by irregular structures. He asked us to go slow and to stay organized.

Steps for creating shadows:

1. First, check the overall angle for the shadow and draw a straight line
2. Next, look for irregularities and draw them
3. Then, look for small local shadows
4. Lastly, cross hash the shadow area. Keep the value scale of the entire drawing in mind while shading.

Tip: Start with the central part of a figure

Art course in Paris (2014)→ Week 5 and 6

Last two weeks were all about drawing hands and feet. We learnt about how to break a big form into small chunks. Also learnt about tonality of the form.

Here are some of my drawings of hands

"Hand drawing 1"

"Hand drawing 2"

"Hand drawing 3"

"Hand drawing 4"

"Hand drawing 5"

"Hand drawing 6"

And here are my final week figure drawings:

"Sketches from Live model (on the left) and at the Louvre (on the right)"

Art course in Paris (2014)→ Week 1

I was super excited about the first day of the class. I reached the studio on time to meet my new art teachers — Timothy and Michelle. They were super nice and greeted me right at the entrance. There were people from different countries — Australia, United States, Belgium, Canada and France — who had travelled all the way for the class. Some students were returning for the fourth time. As we spoke talked about our experiences over wine and beer, I felt I belonged here.

Next day on we started drawing. We spent our mornings drawing at the studio and our afternoons practicing at the Louvre. Tim and Michelle asked us to first draw the figure using the techniques we knew and then later gave personal critiques to every body. My figure drawing on day 1 was hilarious and I made the most common mistake that everyone makes — starting from top of the page and running out of space at the end. It was difficult for me to draw figures as I didn’t know how.

Then Tim taught us a new technique for figure drawing that describes overall gesture of the figure. They called it inner movement curves. We start with drawing a line from the crown of the head down the center line of the face passing further down to tip of the toe. The next line travels from the top of the head, wrapping around the body in the opposite direction and down to the toe of another leg. Third one is for the arms. We started with 5 min poses and drew the three curvy lines describing the gesture.

"Inner movement curve @Louvre"

It was a fun exercise. The idea was to understand the gesture of the overall figure. The lines do not represent the boundary or some part of the figure. It just represents the movement. There can be an infinite number of movement curves or lines and hence we can draw more than 3 if we like.

It took me a lot of time and practice to get them right. Since the second half of our day was spent at the Louvre, I got a lot of sculptures to practice from.

Later during the week, I learnt another technique using Boxes. We drew boxes or cubes for the head, torso, chest, arms and legs. It helped me in understanding the tilt of the body and its planes. I drew the inner movement curve first and then the boxes. However, they can exist independently too.

"Figure in Boxes: @Louvre"

We practiced these for the rest of the week.

"Practicing from one of Ruben’s paintings"

Art course in Paris (2014)→ Week 2

Week 2 began with block-ins. Tim taught us how to draw envelops and block-in the main shapes. Here are a few ones i did:

"Figure Drawing 1"

"Figure Drawing 2"

The idea is to draw in the bigger shapes and not worry about the minute details. The process starts with the inner movement curve and transforms into an envelope. We then develop the envelope further by blocking in the major shapes. We can even skip the movement curve and go straight to block-ins, however, i felt more comfortable drawing the movement curve first.

There are only straight lines at this stage. We do not draw any curved lines at any point. A few things to look for are:

1. Gesture of the entire pose
2. Foreshortening — i.e. if a leg, an arm or any other body part is going away from you or coming towards you
3. Tilt of the torso — If we get the centre line of the mid section early in the process, we can draw the remaining

Tomorrow i am going to the Louvre to practice this stage.