Sketchbook page.
Edit: realised that 2H pencil is nearly invisible so here’s a digitally enhanced version
Tag: figure study
Figure drawings. (I tend to draw in nearly invisible 2H pencil, so I’ve upped the contrast in Photoshop.)
I have this strange urge to paper the walls of the studio with bodies. I picture the room teeming with figures, looming over the space, a bit like murals in some ancient tomb, except for some reason they’re all faceless and have no feet. I might be working on a potential installation that expresses something poignant about the human condition. Or I might just be drawing myself some company because I’m lonely.
…It can be both.
Graphite on paper, each approx 4ft tall.
Back. Oil on paper.
I’ve been trying to find a new way to deal with bodies. This was initially a lot smoother, more carefully rendered. Then I basically started torturing it with a palette knife and now up close it looks like the whole surface of the skin is bristling with static.
Detail from a figure study. (Oil on paper.)
Female figure study, graphite + white pencil on recycled paper.
Sketchin’ some ladies for a change.
Yet another torso. My studio is littered with body parts these days. It looks like the scene of a tasteful accident.
(Detail.) Oil on paper, work in progress.
Struggling a bit with this one. I think I’ve figured out why. “Paint a figure study in oils” is basically my artistic default setting: it’s an almost automatic response to a blank canvas. But my oil painting technique is slow and methodical and involves building lots of layers and occupying the same mindset for as long as it takes to finish the damn thing. I am not in the right frame of mind for that just now. My interests are all over the place and I’m acting on impulse a lot and I’m not in the mood for reflection. Gotta find a new technique.
Detail, work in progress (torso). Oil on paper.
Quick figure study. Graphite and white pencil on brown paper.
It feels good to draw bodies again.
Pencil sketch, manipulated in Photoshop.
In between semi-abstract landscape paintings that I despair of ever finishing, I’ve been trying to remember how to draw. Focusing on hands, wrists & elbows.
Pencil sketches on paper (detail).