Introduction to Drawing 1
I want to post a drawing from Spring term of 2008. This is by Linda Vigelund. I am also posting her own description about this drawing. If you read all the way to the bottom, you will see her assessment of her progress.
Linda Vigelund, Los Zapatos, graphite on paper, 2008.
“I drew a pair of black patent leather strappy sandals for this assignment. The composition is pleasing, and it is well placed on the page (something that is a challenge for me). The shoes are the focus of the composition with just a little context supplied by the shadows. It is an informal composition, with the shoes appearing as if they were just taken off and set down somewhere. There is no background. There is negative space between the shoes and within the straps.
The straight-on shoe did not take an inordinate amount of measuring before its shape and proportions looked correct. It took vast amounts of measuring to get the angled shoe to not look as if it were twisted in the middle, but it finally happened. It is interesting how little it takes to get the proportion off. In the case of the angled shoe, eventually all it took to make it look realistic was to change the angle of the bottom of the heel a slight amount.
The measured drawing was very flat and disappointing. I could tell most of the measurements were pretty accurate, but the shape of the toes of the sandals seemed too rounded. There was a bit of a point to the toe, but it was not apparent in the measured drawing. As I began to add value, however, the sandals began to have a sense of depth, and the toes began to point. The drawing continued to look very blah until I got the first layer of value over the whole drawing. Then, even though it was obvious that the drawing was not finished, it had the illusion of being in three dimensions.
There is a lot of light and shadow in this drawing. There are the shadows cast by the shoes themselves, and there are the shadows across the insoles made by the straps. The straps are a very shiny material with some bright highlights and a lot of reflected light. I was able to capture the contrast in the soft texture of the suede insoles and the slickness of the black patent leather straps.
This was an interesting exercise in observing the variation of light within the local tone of a totally black object, the opposite end of the spectrum from observing the variation of dark within the local tone of a totally white object. As with the Voltaire, I found that the longer I looked at the sandals, the more levels of local tone I could see.
I chose graphite for my medium. With the smudge technique, I have much more control over the blending of value, getting much smoother transitions. I feel graphite is much more forgiving during the gesture and measuring stages. I hate the dry feel of charcoal, whereas I find the wood-free pencils to be very pleasing to the touch.
My drawing has improved greatly in the course of this class. I have progressed from inaccurate line drawings to very realistic and dimensional value drawings. I’ve learned to be patient with the early stages as I have observed that a drawing, in a sense, is an organic thing. It has to go through its awkward growth spurt before it becomes mature, and you can see how it finally turns out.”
