100 Heads: Head #61

This is my copy of a self-portrait by Kathe Kollwitz (1867-1945), a German artist who specialized in print making and whose work highlighted the plight of the poor and oppressed. I used medium vine charcoal to outline the face and then used compressed charcoal for tone, on Strathmore charcoal paper.

In my last post, I mentioned I copy master portraits in order to improve my observation skills. Here, I was also trying to expand my toolkit of techniques. This portrait is an example of modeled drawing. Darker tone is used to push the form away from the viewer, and lighter tone is used to bring the form towards the viewer. The range of values do not represent the range of lights and darks that result from a light source shining on the subject. I like the exaggerated angular features and the way the texture of the paper is incorporated into the portrait. The resulting portrait is very expressive.

I think Kollwitz outlined the face in charcoal and then used a piece of charcoal on its side to quickly model the head. This technique is quick to execute, but requires great skill to do well. It must take years of drawing practice to get to the point where the tones are laid down correctly on the first try. My copy is 9" x 12", which I found to be a little small. I think a larger size paper would make it easier to vary the pressure and resulting charcoal tone in one sweeping arm movement.

Here is a side-by-side comparison of my drawing and Kollwitz's. I am going to try a self-portrait using this technique.

Illustration Friday - The Zoo

This is a child's stuffed animal zoo. Sepia .05 Micron pen on 9" x 12" Strathmore 400 Series Sketch Pad Paper.

Christopher Sleeping

This is a modeled drawing of my son Christopher. 5B pencil on 9" x 12" Strathmore 400 Series Sketch Pad Paper.

I am reading The Zen of Seeing by Frederick Franck, a book I am finding very inspiring. Here is one quote:

Who is man, the artist? He is the unspoiled core of everyman, before he is choked by schooling, training, conditioning until the artist-within shrivels up and is forgotten. Even in the artist who is professionally trained to be consciously "creative" this unspoiled core shrivels up in the rush toward a "personal style", in the heat of competition to be "in". And yet that core is never killed completely.

Happily, the book offers advice on how to re-connect to the core. The book views drawing as a form of meditation and a way to connect to all things.

Stuffed Bunny

This is my younger son's favorite stuffed animal, drawn from life. I didn't use any pencil on this one; I just made little marks with the pen until the image emerged. I used the modeled drawing technique, which I learned in Robert Kaupelis' book Learning to Draw. In this technique, you don't duplicate the actual values you see--i.e., you don't worry about the way light hits the form. Rather, you make the values darker as the form moves back into space. Micron pen on 9" x 12" Strathmore 400 Series Sketch Pad Paper.

Sue Smith (Ancient Artist ) has tagged me. According to the rules, I must reveal seven facts about myself and then tag seven other bloggers. I am thinking! The seven facts will be revealed in tomorrow's post.