"Mermeh" ~ or "Why I decided to go to Figure Drawing"

This drawing dates from YEARS ago... I just found it two days ago and had a good laugh. How nice of me to share something I find sub-par, eh? 

I drew this from a photo in a men's health magazine (they also feature many healthy female specimens of the species). I wanted a three-dimentional feel but didn't know how to lay down angles and straight lines, like building a structure to pour the concrete into....

so this is from about four years ago - 2007. I would like to think I've improved. I've learned, at least, that the best results come from drawing from life. Yes, a live model moves and breathes and eventually relaxes or tightens the muscles. Long pose models soften and slouch while gesture models firm up with the effort of twisting and holding themselves in such dynamic ways. Like day and night. I need both. It's good to learn how to move your drawing with the model. If you make the mark once you can CERTAINLY make it again, so I'm crazy with my eraser. I use it as much as I use the pencil.

Drawing from life really feels like tracing. What I'm tracing is in front of my face, not under the paper, and that is the only difference. I begin by picking raw straight lines out of the air around the model and laying them down like sticks on the paper, and soon you have a collection of angles that your brains sees as human. From there I tuck and cut and add and soften. I sculpt with my 2B pencil and my white eraser. I stop thinking and just give in to the motion of the pencil and the light falling gently in front of me, interrupted by the model's volume in space.....

There's also an energy in the drawings taken from life. The give-and-take energy flow between artist and model, subject and author, sparks on the paper. I am a low-fi girl. Give me paper and a pencil and an eraser. Give me a turntable and a vinyl record. Cleaned up digital stuff - well, that's what my frineds are for! I do the pencil work and then pass it along for some sprucing up and a colouring...

the best art is always a co-operative effort. Model and artist, artist and artist, artist and community. It's not easy to keep picking oneself up and keep being social, but without community and co-operation we artists are Nothing.

Here are three recent drawings from gesture drawing. The first two are one - three minute poses, and the third is a 15 minute pose.

And here are two examples of my long-pose work in conte crayons; about 2 hours of solid work. With breaks we stretch it to three.

Thanks for reading!