Figure Drawing: Week Four

Here are some more figure drawings that I have done this week. We did more head studies on Tuesday and then moved on to focusing on the torso on Thursday. The format of this class is that on Tuesdays we spend the whole time drawing from the models and then Thursday we spend about an hour (it's a three hour class) having an anatomy lecture on a specific part of the body. This is the first figure drawing class I have had that actually incorporates teaching about anatomy and I think it is really interesting and is pretty helpful.

Anyway, here are the drawings!

I am providing a slight close up not because it helps you see it much better, but just because I really liked the way his face turned out and I wanted to emphasize it by showing it as its own image. :)

(I am the artist and so it is my prerogative to decide that I really didn't like the way his head turned out so I am only showing you the body. Ha.)

This was my first attempt at doing a sustained pose with GRAPHITE! It was odd to have my dear old friend graphite be so difficult! Apparently graphite doesn't work well on Newsprint. But it was fun and interesting to try a different medium.

I was late to the open drawing lab this morning and so there weren't any open drawing horses. So I had to try to hold my huge pad of Newsprint on my lap. It was difficult. But I got a few gestures that I liked alright!















Also, I wrote a sonnet for my Creative Writing class and since it is about how I feel about Figure Drawing I thought this was as good a place to put it as anywhere!


Figure Drawing

The darkened class with solitary light
Casts shadows soft. The form, anatomy
Unbroken, curves and muscles pull—the sight
At which I stare and set in memory.

As cautious lines from charcoal smooth the page,
My hand is marked by smudges black. The dust
That clings to fingertips serves as the wage
In which I, student artist, now must trust.

To me it seems impossible to draw
And not to fuel a wond’ring sense of all
The skill in hands that take a substance raw
And with an artist’s touch create us all.

What challenge—more a wond’rous privilege sweet—
Is mine to draw His masterpiece complete.