Dana and Jacob - Painting Day 1

So added Amber Shellac and then dove in to the painting. I'm loving how the paint is resolving the background and creating a space.

Jacob is looking flat I need to go to a richer Brown in his flesh tones.

The window is looking crooked.

I need to do a study of boots and the side of a bed.

I am debating leaving Dana unpainted. Is it too much of a gimmick? Is this an action just based on the fear of not tucking this painting up?

I like the idea of a figure separated visual from its sorroundings. The space is intimate but the figure is disjointed and apart from everything. I will have to sleep on this.

Classwork - Figure Drawing - Dana and Jacob - Day 2

Second day on the is drawing.

The boots are Dana's. I asked her to throw them in front of her so I could draw them.  The work in that corner.

I am eager to paint on this.

Classwork - Figure Drawing - Dana and Jacob - Day 1

Class work for figure drawing. This is large. We have one more day on this assignment.

The models are Dana and Jacob. This is the first time I had Dana as a model she is fun to draw.

There is one more day to this pose. So there is more work I can do.

Goodstuff/ Badstuff

Goodstuff
-I like the composition and the poses. The is a mood to the drawing that is looking and feeling very nice.
-Dana's portrait is looking great. Jacob is working. As he's background there is reason for the lack of focus or rendering.

Badstuff or things to fix tomorrow.
Need to define space in the forground.
Background? Either even the tone or make some space choices.
Probably need to work on jacob.

So Vincent Desidario has a work method where you shellac the page after working on it with charcoal. The it acts as a semi closed ground for painting. The charcoal remains as a ground/under painting. I think I will go back into all the large drawings with this method. I am kind of eager to see what comes of this. I'm looking forward to playing with the drawing and painting interplay. While tomorrow I'm going to draw. I think all of the large scale drawings I did are going to benefit from the process.

Classwork - Figure Drawing - Comparative Anatomy

Luther and Karen - 11/30/15 - 3'x5', Conte on Paper

Figure Drawing class and working big again (36"x 48"). The overall goal was to compare the anatomy between both sexes. The class was two long poses. The first with Luca, and then the afternoon with Karen.

I wish I took a photo with just the Luca pose in there. My goal was to get the whole figure in the page. I covered up a great right hand with the second pose.

I am pretty happy with this drawing. However the lament is that to get this drawing finished will take a few more hours of work. There is a great feeling of space between the two models. Used a chamois to smudge the earlier drawing of Luca to the background.

Things to fix when I get some time to work on this:

• I think the room perspective is a little steep.
• The highlight on Luca's stomach is popping to the foreground.
• A little more dark shades in the figure of Luca. The chamois took away a little too much of the darks in places.
• General focus on background forms paying close attention to straightening the lines and even out the dark to light transitions.

Classwork - Structual Anatomy - Watercolor

Classwork - 11/11/2015, 18"x24", watercolor 

So, the écorché exercise went well this morning. In the afternoon, we had to do drawings of the back of our model. I did the above watercolor. The focus was on the large muscle groups of the back.

I think the painting works, but I think I'm moderately successful at defining the muscle groupings. The value of the ecorché exercise and learning anatomy is being able to add that knowledge to a piece when the visual information is lacking. 

Figure Drawing 2015-11-07 - Luca

Luca 11/09/15, Conté on Paper, 3'x5'

Working big again. This time in black and white instead of toned paper. The drawing is powerful to stand in front of because of its scale and contrast. I am liking what I'm able to get done in the four hours of my six hour of class, but there are some problems with this drawing.

I am liking the effect of the chamois to give a base tone to things. It lets me pull texture in the highlights with an eraser and is making a nice effect on his chest

I am a little unhappy with the right hand and foot. The foot especially looks kind of flat.

Classwork- History/Compositon - Day 2 - Rayne

Rayne-09/08/15-Pose 2 , Watercolor, 11"x15"

"Are you going to work from the model today?" A classmate asked me.

"Of course," I said simply, "I always work from a model if given a choice."
 
Day 2 for History/Composition. We got to see some of my classmates work and I was impressed not only with the dedication but the commitment to ideas that I saw.

I was ill-prepared for class today. I forgot my watercolor at home so I had to run out to the store and buy a tube of burnt sierra and cobalt blue.

So fresh tube of paint in hand I began to paint furiously. I had a little trouble on the first pose. The painting above was second pose of the class.

I exaggerated the pose a bit to make it a bit more dynamic. I managed to pull a lot more range of tones in the flesh in this painting. I really like this painting.  There is a nice mood to it.

Rayne-09/08/15-Pose 1 , Watercolor, 11"x15"

Above is the first pose of the class. It's okay overall, but there are some problems.

I don't like how static the pose is. It is a little stiff and I have some areas of the body that need a bit of resolution. I think got a little distracted by the face in this painting. Is is resolved well but it is at the expense of the rest of the body. I wish I defined the chair shape a little more. It's a little amorphous, in a distracting way.

I was not able to get a varied a range of tones into the figure of the pose. I think I was getting used to the two color painting. It takes a bit to get used to, but this was a great warm-up.

Overall, this was a great session with Rayne.

Re: INVITATION: Drawing @ the academy | Thursday September 3 |

Reign 09/03/15 , Watercolor, 11"x 15"

Day 3

Opening my email.

Hello Students Staff and Faculty!
The Operations and Student Services Departments would like you to join us for an evening of a long pose drawing, painting or sculpture and beat the heat. Thursday evening September 3rd!
We will be setting up 2 models in the air conditioned Wilkinson Hall starting at 5:30 pm going until 8:30 pm tomorrow night, One pose for the duration of the evening.
Ice Cold drinks to be served along with music. Come on down to the hall and have some fun, make some work and cool off for a bit. See you there.
Hope to see you there!

"In a 3 hour pose I can get a pretty good watercolor going," I said as I read the email. 

The event was a great community building activity centered around figure drawing. 
I went and was impressed by the number of people who came out and their skill level. It was also neat to see many members of the staff there drawing, too. It's nice to know that this place is not only home to a number of great artists but also administered by a number of great artist too.

I am pretty happy with my painting above.

The model was Reign. She wore a collection of necklaces and ornamentation that I thought would be a blast to render in watercolor. I think I managed to get some of the shine and glare right.

I was dreading painting the parasol. Japanese and Chinese brushpainting is full of great renderings of these that look effortless. It is a complicated but delicate form.

She took a pose that was very stiff, both feet planted on the floor, It makes sense from her perspective-- it's a three-hour pose and she has to get comfortable. But I improvised the feet of this pose to make it a little more dynamic.

Horse Skeleton

Horse Skeleton 09/02/2015, Ink on Paper, 9"x 12"

September 2, 2015 - Day 2
 
So when I saw the horse Skeleton in the sculpture room I was unsure what to think.

"They made a big deal out of this you know," a classmate told me. "Did you go to the open house day?"

I shook my head.

"Yeah, I went and they made a big deal out of it." He then said, " I don't really get what the big deal is."

So today I had to wait around after anatomy class and I decided to sketch the skeleton. A friend of a friend wanted a drawing of a horse skeleton for a literary magazine she was working on. So I figured this was a great opportunity. 

 As I was sketching, my ear bud blaring, someone came up to me.

"It's hard for me to look at that thing," he said as I pulled out my earbuds. "It keeps getting destroyed," the man said looking intently at the skeleton. "I spent all last year working on this. Maybe I should just stop checking in on it."

The man paused in front of the skeleton and scanned it quickly, exhaled once in a gruff disgust and continued on his way.

I continued to sketch.    

Classwork- History/Compositon - Day 1 - Cyrus

Cyrus 09/01/15 Pose 1, Watercolor, 11"x14"

September 1, 2015

So day one at the New York Academy of Art. My First class was History and Theory of Composition which is one  part history class and one part studio. The work today was to gauge our ability levels. The space we are working in is newly-renovated, so there was a bit of time spent getting the area ready for drawing. 

The model in the afternoon session was Cyrus. He was either Persian or Sikh, I will ask him next time he sits, but either way his body type was a real insight into a class I had a long time ago at the University of Hawaii, Manoa, the Art of Ancient India. 

During that class and looking at slide after slide of statues of the Buddha and other Hindu deities, I always thought the shoulders were exaggerated oddly. But Cyrus's body type really illuminated the body shape those artists were trying to capture. As I'm writing this, this seems like an odd point to be making, but it was a real "Ah Ha" moment even though the realization was rather silly upon reflection.  

The afternoon session was two hour long poses. I know from experience I can get a pretty good watercolor in this time frame.

I worked really systematically the first 20 minutes of the pose on the sketch/outline. The next 20 minutes on blocking in the dark light fields and building the dark. I then spent the last 20  Minutes working on the lighted section for the drawings.           

I am pretty happy with this painting, It's spontaneous; it's well-rendered and has a nice mood to it.

Cyrus 09/01/15 Pose 2, Watercolor, 11"x 14"

Pose 2 was a little rushed and the last pose was collapsed to 5 minutes. As such my same plan fell a little short. I kind of like the effect it made though. I'm finding the incomplete/stylized parts of the form is kind of appealing. I may have to experiment with this and specifically how much of the shadow can I define and still have the form readable.

Speaking of Indian art, I think Cyrus was intentionally making a mudra in this pose.

After Asia By Daniel Chester French

After Asia by Daniel Chester French, Ink on Paper, 9" x 12"

After the orientation meeting for school I had some time before I wanted to head home, so I decided to go back to the National Museum of the Native American and draw another of the statues.

This one is Asia.

I had a lot of fun with this drawing. Coordinating multiple figures in a scene is really challenging and these kind of statues offer some really good practice at these skills.

I like that I was able to add the wash behind the figures and the architectural element on the right.

"Knowledge of divine things is lost to us by incredulity."
~ Heraclitus

After America by Daniel Chester French

After America by Daniel Chester French, Ink on Paper, 9"x 12"

So I'm calling this sketch sightseeing. I think that is the term I will use to describe my copying famous statues in areas. I think it describes the activity well.

For some setting. There are 4 statues in front of the National Museum of the Native American or the Alexander Hamilton US Custom House as a quick Wikipedia search of the location and statues informed me. The Statues were done by Daniel Chester French, who also carved the statue of Lincoln and was called the "Dean of American Sculpture in the 20th century."

I really like the four continent statues. The kneeling male figure in the foreground really caught my eye. It looks really stylized and almost art deco to me. Just the structure and the exaggerated heroic pose.

I spent a while drawing this, I think I will try to do at least parts of the other sculptures.

I really have been debating going into the symbolism of this statue. It is worrisome and dated in the "grandma's racist" sort of way. The other ones are notable worse.

I still had a lot of fun with this drawing. I am mainly enjoying the challenge of multiple figures in a scene interacting to each other. I also love how French's chisels rendered the fabric in these statues. While not the most realistic. It is really stylized and dramatic. It was also a lot of fun to render. 

Jimmy and the Brooklyn Library

Jimmy 08/29/2015, Ink on Paper, 9"x 12"

I have been keeping up with my sketch booking when I met up with a friend who has been living in New York.  This is Jimmy and I sketched him as he smoked his e-cigarette.

He says my sketch doesn't have much of a likeness.

On his left I drew a portrait of a woman I saw reading on the subway.  I like how quickly I was able to capture the odd shape of her hat.

At the Brooklyn Library 8/29/15, Ink on paper, 9"x 12"

I was exploring a bit and wandered into Brooklyn.  I was having a good time walking until the heat got a little unbearable and I took refuge in a branch of the Brooklyn Public Library. The place reminded me of home and the libraries there.

It was a weird collection of prominently used dated technology, "Read" posters, strangely worded signs, kids quietly enjoying themselves, and some kids goofing off in the corner-- obviously there against their will.

I began drawing the kids playing on their phones before their mom took them home. Mom was carrying a large stack of books. Talk about a flashback. I have been in the same position as those kids many a time in my childhood.

"Books, the children of the brain."
~ Jonathan Swift

Self Portrait - Fountain Pen Ink

Self Portrait 8/28/15, Ink on Paper, 9"x 12"

August 28, 2015

So on my first day in New York, my landlord was gracious enough to show me how to get to the Art Academy on the subway from the house. It's an easy trip, the ferry is nice, and both the bus ride to the ferry and the subway trip are super simple.

While I was out and about I decided to do some art supply shopping. I brought both my fountain pens, but I had no ink. I felt really uneasy packing my 3 oz glass Noodler ink bottles. With my luck, and the way baggage is handled, I would landed in New York with two broken bottles of ink and a suitcase full of ink stained clothes, I figured I could buy ink in New York.

So for a few hours I went to art supplies stores and asked the workers for fountain pen ink. Then this process would repeat itself: 1) They would look at me oddly 2) Bring me to their ink section and finally 3) suggest a bottle of ink "they think" would work with fountain pens. Being unfamiliar with the ink, I would google "X brand use with Fountain Pens" and then it would link to to a forum where there is all capital letters saying "NOT FOR USE WITH FOUNTAIN PENS."

This literally happened three times before I thought to just google "Noodler Ink NYC" and I got the location of the "Fountain Pen Hospital." The store is impressive (And really fancy) and they had every variety of ink for my pens.

I spent a bit before deciding on the colors "Antietam" and "Walnut." Antietam is a red that is darker and bluer then the more orange red ink I have been using, The Walnut is a pretty nice and rich brown.

The lady who rang me up was really cute and reminded me of my mom.

"You need a bag?"

 "No," I said pointing to my messenger bag while placing it on the glass display case, I unfastening the clips and looked up.

There was a look of  knowing worry in her face as she said simply, "Use the bag, you'll make me feel better."

I nodded yes for the bag. I saw that I had no choice but to obey.

"They're gonna be banging up against each other in your bag. They're glass and if they break..." She paused as I placed the two boxes of ink in the bag, "At least if they break in your bag the plastic bag will keep it"

With that I raced out of the store.

So with a new sketchbook, new ink and new City I decided to do a self portrait.

It was pretty quick sketch, It's kind of unflattering and my lip is a little off.

I look tired.  Packing my life and moving 4000 miles was not easy. It's been a long couple days.

"If you must live in a city, New York is the only city in the world."
~ Katherine Neville

Honolulu Museum of Art Figure Drawing 6/08/2015 - Sergio - Long Poses

Sergio 06/08/15 - Pose 2, 9"x12", Watercolor

These are the long poses from this Monday's figure drawing class at the Honolulu Art Museum School. Each of these are the 20 minute poses from the session.

Above is my favorite of the night. True to form it was the second pose of the night. I have been finding the second drawing/painting of the night is my favorite. It is becoming a very common trend.

I like extreme foreshortening in reclining poses. I actually usually move to the floor like with this drawing. I like how most everything reads except the left leg, it bugs me a little. I do like the other leg and foot.

Sergio 06/08/15 - Pose 1, 9"x12", Watercolor

This was the first pose of the night. I think there are some elements that are really working, but there are some elements that are really not working.

Sergio 06/08/15 - Pose 3, 9"x12", Watercolor

This was the third pose of the night. I do not thing is came out that good. I may reuse this page.

The Honolulu Museum of Art Figure Drawing class is every Monday at 7 PM. It is located at 1111 Victoria Street. There is a $10 class fee.

Honolulu Museum of Art Figure Drawing 6/08/2015 - Sergio - Short Poses

Sergio 6/08/15 Short 03 , 9"x12", Ink on Paper.

These are from the Monday drawing class at the Honolulu Museum of Art

I just bought some new watercolor brushes and was really desperate to try them out. So I was using Burnt Umber and Cobalt Blue watercolor for these. I like these two colors because they create a nice range of warms and cool tones and they cancel each other out very nicely to create a chromatic gray.

I really like these three short poses. So much so its that I wanted to make a separate post for them on the blog.

Above is the 10 minute pose. It was a pretty straight forward watercolor technique. I did a quick contour line drawing of the figure then added the watercolors starting from light then working to the darks.

The left hand is a little big. But other then that I really like this painting.

Sergio 6/08/15 Short 01 , 9"x12", Ink on Paper.

For the two 5 minute poses I drew a contour line drawing and then added the watercolor on another day. These actually came out very nicely. I may have to try this technique in the future as I am really satisfied with these two paintings.

This painting shows a lot of what I like about using the burnt umber and the Cobalt blue. The warm of the figures shoulder and face contrast nicely against the cool of the cobalt blue shadows. The chromatic gray that is created when the mix really makes for interesting shadowed tones.

Sergio 6/08/15 Short 02 , 9"x12", Ink on Paper.

This is the second of the 2 minute poses. I think i spent too much time getting the ears just right in the drawing phase. The watercolor looks great.

The Honolulu Museum of Art Figure Drawing class is every Monday at 7 PM. It is located at 1111 Victoria Street. There is a $10 class fee.

Honolulu Museum of Art Figure Drawing 6/08/2015 - Sergio - Gestures

Sergio 06/08/15 Gesture 08, 9"x12", Ink on Paper.

Monday was figure drawing at the Honolulu Museum of Art; I had a really good night.

I came to the session a little late. It's graduation season, and parking around the Art Academy was terrible. So I was walking into the class about 7:15. Apparently others also had this problem and when I walked in they were only starting the first of the gestures. 

I was kind of in a panic to start. So I started with what I am really great with, the Tombow pens. However by gesture four I realized this wasn't really going to help with what I had planned for the rest of the night. I just went to Fishers Hawaii earlier that day and bought new watercolor bushes that I really wanted to try. So I switched to a thin pen to mimic the contour line drawing I would have to be doing for the rest of the night. 

I really like the above gesture, number 8. It was an unusual pose, but I managed to capture a lot in the brief amount of time. The way the figure is splayed across the page is very dynamic. I also love the balance of the shaded areas on the page. I also find the differently weighted lines and their interactions very interesting. 

Sergio 06/08/15 Gesture 01, 9"x12", Ink on Paper.

I was using the gray Tombow then adding the black and the water afterwards. The effect created by this is really a lot of fun.

Sergio 06/08/15 Gesture 02, 9"x12", Ink on Paper.

This is a great pose and great gesture. The difference in tone creates a difference in the weight in the two legs. The darker back leg pushes deeper in the composition and the lighter leg pulls forward.

Sergio 06/08/15 Gesture 03, 9"x12", Ink on Paper.

This gesture has a Keith Haring feel to it. It could be the pose but it also could mean I over did the outline,

Sergio 06/08/15 Gesture 04, 9"x12", Ink on Paper.

This pose is hilarious. Looking at this gesture makes me laugh just remembering it.

Sergio 06/08/15 Gesture 05, 9"x12", Ink on Paper.

It was here I switched to the thinner pen. I focused on the figure's contour outlines and then with any remaining time I tried to block in the major shadow ares. This is to try and imitate the process I would have to zip through in the later poses.  Afterwards, like a day later, I added the crosshatching to the shade regions.

Above Number 5 is very dynamic. This is a great gesture.

Sergio 06/08/15 Gesture 06, 9"x12", Ink on Paper.

I like this gesture too. His arms are a little odd in this one but it's working in my opinion.

Sergio 06/08/15 Gesture 07, 9"x12", Ink on Paper.

I do not like this one at all.

Sergio 06/08/15 Gesture 09 , 9"x12", Ink on Paper.

For the last one I used the black Tombow and water to fill in the shadows. It creates a nice effect but I actually prefer the crosshatching.

The Honolulu Museum of Art Figure Drawing class is every Monday at 7 PM. It is located at 1111 Victoria Street. There is a $10 class fee.

"See, when I paint, it is an experience that, at its best, is transcending reality. When it is working, you completely go into another place, you're tapping into things that are totally universal, completely beyond your ego and your own self." ~ Keith Haring

Honolulu Museum of Art Figure Drawing 4/27/2015 - Sergio - Short Poses

Sergio - 4/27/15 - Gesture 02, 9"x 12", Ink on Paper

So the model was Sergio and as always he was fun to draw and paint. I was really on this this night and am happy with almost all of the drawings today.

That night I had forgot my bag of Tombow pens. It was a rather sad discovery, but I did have a Pilot G2 10 millimeter, my favorite writing pen. The fact I have a favorite pen is sign of my mother's genetic expression. It's been a while since I have drawn with these pens. Normally I would draw with a thinner pen, but we make do.
   

Afterwards I went back into the gestures and added Sharpie to the drawings. I am very happy with the results. Above is one of my favorite drawings of the night.

A lot of elements are working in this gesture. The pose is very dynamic. The alternating lines and overall pattern of the ink lines is working very well.

Below are the rest of the gestures from the night. I am really satisfied with them.

Sergio - 4/27/15 - Gesture 01, 9"x 12", Ink on Paper.

Sergio - 4/27/15 - Gesture 03, 9"x 12", Ink on Paper

Sergio - 4/27/15 - Gesture 04, 9"x 12", Ink on Paper

Sergio - 4/27/15 - Gesture 05, 9"x 12", Ink on Paper

Sergio - 4/27/15 - Gesture 06, 9"x 12", Ink on Paper

Sergio - 4/27/15 - Gesture 07, 9"x 12", Ink on Paper

Sergio - 4/27/15 - Gesture 08, 9"x 12", Ink on Paper

There is a very neat feel to this one. I am a little unhappy with the hand. The darkness and the frantic lines of the gesture are working very well.

Sergio - 4/27/15 - Gesture 09, 9"x 12", Ink on Paper

Normally when I don't have 10 gesture drawings it means something went wrong. I was late or one of the drawings was just terrible. However, Today's class was a "Field Promotion" day, the normal people who run the class were out sick so it left me in charge of the class. I miscounted the number of gesture drawings I had already done and thus we were one short. 

Sergio - 4/27/15 - Short 01, 9"x 12", Ink on Paper

Short poses went pretty well. I need to watch myself when I'm doing my cross hatching especially in these shorter poses. These two five minute drawings show a problem I need to catch: I need to alternate my Hatch marks. The pattern created by them all going one direction is distracting. Above we see a drawing where I alternated the hatching.

The figure seems to have a greater volume to it and the different hatch directions help define the figure.  

Sergio - 4/27/15 - Short 02, 9"x 12", Ink on Paper

This drawing shows what happens when I fail to alternate the hatch direction. One of many problems with this drawing.

Sergio - 4/27/15 - Short 03, 9"x 12", Ink on Paper

This was the 10 minute drawing. I like it. The head is a little off.

The Honolulu Museum of Art Figure Drawing class is every Monday at 7 PM. It is located at 1111 Victoria Street. There is a $10 class fee.

Honolulu Museum of Art Figure Drawing 3/30/2015 - Shilo - Long Poses

Shilo - 3/30/15 - Pose 2, 9"x 12", Acrylic on Paper.

Another week at the Honolulu Art Academy. The model was Shilo. I had a pretty great night.

Above is my favorite of the three paintings I did.  It was the second pose of the night.

I focused a lot of effort on the background. My normal solution to the background issue is a simple wall behind model or a nearly uniform color field but I have been finding them more and more dull . The semicircular shape in the background of color is my attempt at altering that a little.  My goal in the future is to  try and abstract the natural forms behind the model into color fields. I have been enjoying the results. 

I am finding these acrylic studies very time consuming. The refinement the paint allows has me spending the week working on these during my off periods however I am loving the results.

I am finding it troublesome to work on older studies from classes past. I feel that I forget what I found dynamic about the pose and I hate the final results. I am also learning that not every one of these studies can work. Sometimes 25 minutes is just not enough time to capture what is needed. 

Shilo - 3/30/15 - Pose 1, 9"x 12", Acrylic on Paper.

This was pose 2. I do love how I rendered this back. Its getting to what I really like about these acrylic studies. Quick and expressive brushstrokes while still rendering the form accurately. I know it's the accurate rendering that often suffers as a do these quick poses.

The Honolulu Museum of Art Figure Drawing class is every Monday at 7 PM. It is located at 1111 Victoria Street. There is a $10 class fee.

"Art isn’t every­thing. It’s just about every­thing."

~ Gertrude Stein

Study of Olomana 03/27/15

Olomana - 03/27/15, 9"x 12", Ink on paper.

I have been wanting to do a few studies of Mt. Olomana for a while, perhaps to do a few more large scale paintings of it. It has been an idea I have been ruminating on.

One of my students had a seizure. I had to hold him on his side till the ambulance came and took his vital signs. We then kept a vigil on him during the postictal phase, where he was unconscious like in a deep sleep. It was during this awkward waiting time I sketched this.

Olomana is a really pretty mountain. There is not much to it but it is a great landmark on the windward side of Oahu. 

Dealing with the emergency situation of students seizure was a jarring and this sketch seems like a strange artifact of that experience.

Honolulu Museum of Art Figure Drawing - March 23, 2015 - Tina - Long Poses

Tina - 3/23/15 - Pose 2, 9"x12", Acrylic on Paper.

It has been a while since Tina was a model at the Honolulu Museum of Art Figure Drawing class. Its been more then a year.

This was a great pose and I love this painting. There is a great balance between the expressive brushstrokes and how well rendered it is.

Her hair is much lighter then how I rendered it here. However there is a great effect to the darker hair. It is doing a great job separating the figures torso from her other arm.

I am getting much better at utilizing the three colors and getting a pretty wide range of colors from them. limiting my palette to three colors and seeing how far i could push the colors hase been a great learning opportunity. I am fascinated by the differences in the flesh tones. How ocher the yellow in her legs look and how pink the highlights on her chest look.     

The Honolulu Museum of Art Figure Drawing class is every Monday at 7PM. It is located at 1111 Victoria Street. There is a $10 class fee. 

Honolulu Museum of Art Figure Drawing March 9,2015 - Tom

Tom 03-09-15 Page 1, Acrylic and Ink on Paper, 9”x 12”

I was working with my three color acrylic paintings (Cad Yellow, Cad Red and Cobalt Blue). There were a couple of odd moments from this drawing session. The most notable is what I thought was rather devastating turned out to be very interesting. I forgot my drawing paper this class and had only my mixed media paper. I adapted quickly as  have done similar to these with my oil pastel drawings.

Overall these drawings look like complete pages and were easier to "complete" but I don't like them as much as my fully painted pages. 

I really like how these pages came out. I do miss my gesture pages with the ink and wash. I may do a combo of the two types of gesture drawing in future sessions.

Tom is always entertaining to draw. He usually takes very theatrical poses playing to his strengths; however this night he was taking very difficult poses. He was balancing precariously on top of furniture and really pushing his (and the classes' for that matter) comfort zone. 

In the above pose he was balanced on a collection of furniture. I like how all the poses are reading in this page. The bleed through on the earlier poses and the incomplete ares of the painting make for very interesting shapes. I think this is the most successful page of the night.

I think the longer poses make for better background drawings. I really like how the sharpie line work reads from under the washed paint.

Tom 03-09-15 Page 2, Acrylic and Ink on Paper, 9”x 12”

Marc Brown's comment for this pose was "what gear are you in Tom?" as he basically created a balance beam and perched himself on top of it.

I really like my use of gray in the arms. It's reading as a cold shadow space.

Tom 03-09-15 Page 3, Acrylic and Ink on Paper, 9”x 12”

This collection of gestures was my favorite and worked really well as a page. The dark spaces and shadows are creating some neat patterns.

This does run into a problem with this particular system. I was really attached to the gesture drawing page and did not want to obscure it with a large painting. I should have probably made the figure larger and turned the page. I was treating the drawings as delicate and then painting around it and that lead to a less effective page.

Overall good night. There were a lot of insights gained. 

The Honolulu Museum of Art Figure Drawing class is every Monday at 7PM. It is located at 1111 Victoria Street. There is a $10 class fee. 

“Come on. I don't have any problem violating my own insights in practice.” 
~ Slavoj Žižek