A Series of Cast Drawings
Having completed three of the four series of drawings of features (eyes, noses, hands and mouths,) I've just embarked on a new series. This series is going to be a bit tougher than the last lot, and will take some time I think.
A few months back I got hold of a reconstituted marble bust of Clytie (I think it's Clytie,) with the intention of doing some atelier style cast drawings. A classic nineteenth century atelier training would begin with copies, like say the Bargue plates or something similar, before progressing onto drawing from casts. After these two stages were completed, students would move on to drawing from life.
I'm a spoiled, impatient twentieth century westerner, so I'm doing everything in the wrong order. Or rather, I'm doing everything at the same time. But drawing from a cast will be, for me, something like drawing from a model, so will be very good practice for portraits. And the nice thing about Clytie is she doesn't fidget, doesn't need breaks, and doesn't need paying. She'll happily sit for me all day with a gentle smile and no complaints. Here she is. Say hi to everybody Clytie.
I'm taking my lead from the progression of the Bargue plates for these drawings, and plan to stay one step ahead of what I'm doing with the cast drawings on the Bargue drawings, so that at least I'll have tried a copy once before I try to do a similar drawing from the cast.
All the drawings are being done sight-size. Although I've toyed with sight size with some of my still life paintings, I'm applying the technique much more stringently now. The basic idea, like pretty much everything else I do, is to improve my ability to see, to judge shapes and their relationships better, and to learn how to simplify form. Sight size cast drawing is like extreme eye training.
You can read all about sight size and the first drawing here:
Posted 31st July 2006
First cast drawing - Cytie One
