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| 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.
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.
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| 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.
Welcome to New York!
ReplyDeleteI chanced upon your blog. I found these, particularly pose 1, reminiscent of Andre Derain's "Bathers". But then again I am biased toward that painting. Lookout for that painting whenever you get to the MoMA.
Good luck with your art.