A better photo of the bearded old man portrait, chalk and pencil drawing

This is the other drawing that I submitted for the group show. It has a certain softness that the other one doesn't. I have both drawings framed and matted. I went with a wide 8 ply gray mat, slightly darker than the paper, inside a simple wooden frame. I will post more about framing in the future because I believe it can make or break a good piece of art. I titled this one Philosopher. I hate titling work and I will say more about that in a future post as well.

pencil and chalk portrait studies

Here are a few new ones. I have been working hard, trying to keep busy and stay motivated. I've submitted two drawings for a show and they are currently being framed. I hope they at least choose one for the exhibition. 

This first one is unfinished currently. I think it's off to a good start. I don't normally draw like this but I've decided to use some pastel.

This next one is finished and one of the two submitted for the show. I had wanted to do something with a lot of texture and I am happy with the result. I hope to do more portraits like these two. 

Graphite and Chalk Chiaroscuro Portrait Drawing Final Form

This is the drawing in it's final form. Graphite and Chalk on Canson toned pastel paper. The paper has a textured side and a smooth side. I used the smooth side. 6B is the darkest pencil I used for this. I am always shy about going too dark. This drawing is not matted yet. This image is just the drawing with a pre-cut matte held up to it. I'm not at all sure how I want to display this but I am leaning towards a wider matte ultimately.

Unfinished Drawing Part 2

There is still a lot of work to be done on this drawing but like I said, it's great to document the progress. It's a great way to show why it takes so much time to produce a quality drawing. As you can see the image has developed a lot since the first session. I need to start paying closer attention to how many hours I put into a work of art. This is probably the hardest portrait I have ever tried to produce. I would love to be finished with this after the third session but that probably won't happen.

Today I met with a college art professor. I hadn't really ever considered graduate school but that might be a realistic consideration. First I'd like to concentrate on putting together a cohesive body of work. I must stay motivated, inspired, and working on new pieces.

A friend let me borrow an interesting book called The Painted Word by Tom Wolfe. So far I'm really into it and finding it suitable to my growth as an artist.

Unfinished Drawing

I often like when a painting or drawing is unfinished or intentionally left unfinished. For this reason I like to take photos of the piece as I work on it. If It suddenly starts to look bad I can refer to the earlier photo. Taking several pictures allows me to see the process in steps once I've stopped.

Here is the unfinished portrait I'm working on today.

Drawing

I have had my artistic ambition lead me to many different pursuits including photography, graffiti, music, writing, bonsai, painting, etc. It all started from a very young age when I decided to go beyond coloring books and try drawing my own images. It turned out that I had some natural aptitude for drawing. Drawing was always my gateway into art. For that reason I will always feel a strong connection to drawing.

Lately I have been focusing on portraits. It's never been easy for me to choose a subject matter to draw. I am always looking for inspiration.

It wasn't easy drawing Doug but he has a great face for it with lots of complexity in the shadows. I purposely under-rendered the hair. I think a lot of artists over do hair an it has the tendency to look less like hair in some cases. Really, it depends on the image as to how much detail I put into the hair. I always think less is more when it comes to things like that but sometimes that is just not true. Doug's likeness lies in the subtle complexity of his eyes, mouth, and jaw as well as the spatial relationship between them.

Another recent commission if of someone's dog that had died recently. I had never drawn a dog before so this was an interesting challenge. Same as I mentioned about human hair, a dogs fur is easily over-rendered.

I'm never quite sure what to draw when I'm not being commissioned to draw specific things. I'd like to be more stylized with my drawing eventually. I'm not sure what exactly I mean by that.

I do enjoy drawing very much and I believe there is a meditation involved that is good for the soul.

One thing I have always loved is drapery studies. This one I drew from a drawing out of a book. The original drawing is by Leonardo Da Vinci. His is better but I liked this one so much I had to copy it. Copying masters is a great exercise for an artist. I like the way it turned out so I matted and framed it.

 

 



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