Blog
Life-drawing my Friends
08/08/2020
I've been feeling stale and stuck about figure drawing recently, so I decided to look around for local people to draw. I invited a man who is sometimes a model who has great physical of grace, my neighbo0ur's daughter who has spectacular chestnut tresses, an oldish woman friend who has a great mane of curly and my friend's daughter who was born in Ethiopia.
I asked my first subject to bring an item that 'spoke' of him, and he brought a violin. I sat him against a white wall on a white pedestal, but was too coy to get him to form any challenging poses, and feel I left him confused. I quickly dashed off this life size figure of him as a one-legged redhead. The beard ran away from me though, and the Memphis-style lower region doesn't express much of his inner being. I'll return to this when a little time has passed and more about his personality floats into my hind brain.
Another friend brought her beautiful six year old daughter, whose skin is a gleaming plum brown. I hadn't specified what I wanted her to wear, and the dress she had on was black and white horizontal stripes of increasing size against which was a striking pattern of red roses. This dominated her appearance, and I became shy and could not ask her to pose the way I wanted to. However I have seen her in a fluorescent pink dress with her hair in long plaits, and that fluorescent pink looks amazingly dramatic against her skin. She will retrun to my studio and pose in one of her favourite Pokemon stances.
The last person I drew is the 20 year old daughter of a friend who came to pose in bright purple bellbottoms and earrings and lilac shirt with her her copper hair in heavy hanks. Again I was paralysed by coyness, and failed to diret her with any certainty. But it was when I came across her in a shady car park wearing orange and metallic turquoise outfit that I saw how I had to paint her. Her milky skin has a mother-of-pearl lustre, and there was something folklorique about her costume.
The strange thing about drawing people you know is the burden of making an image that they will like. I can deal with this by paying them, which objectifies and distances them enough for me to feel free to paint adventurously, even rudely and wildly.
It was a mistake not to have rehearsed some poses for them in my head before they came, because I became abashed and did not want to strain their bodies or their patience. I also feel prepared to wait for a while after the drawing session for their meanings, significance, emblems and colours to develop in my imagination.
I asked my first subject to bring an item that 'spoke' of him, and he brought a violin. I sat him against a white wall on a white pedestal, but was too coy to get him to form any challenging poses, and feel I left him confused. I quickly dashed off this life size figure of him as a one-legged redhead. The beard ran away from me though, and the Memphis-style lower region doesn't express much of his inner being. I'll return to this when a little time has passed and more about his personality floats into my hind brain.
Another friend brought her beautiful six year old daughter, whose skin is a gleaming plum brown. I hadn't specified what I wanted her to wear, and the dress she had on was black and white horizontal stripes of increasing size against which was a striking pattern of red roses. This dominated her appearance, and I became shy and could not ask her to pose the way I wanted to. However I have seen her in a fluorescent pink dress with her hair in long plaits, and that fluorescent pink looks amazingly dramatic against her skin. She will retrun to my studio and pose in one of her favourite Pokemon stances.
The last person I drew is the 20 year old daughter of a friend who came to pose in bright purple bellbottoms and earrings and lilac shirt with her her copper hair in heavy hanks. Again I was paralysed by coyness, and failed to diret her with any certainty. But it was when I came across her in a shady car park wearing orange and metallic turquoise outfit that I saw how I had to paint her. Her milky skin has a mother-of-pearl lustre, and there was something folklorique about her costume.
The strange thing about drawing people you know is the burden of making an image that they will like. I can deal with this by paying them, which objectifies and distances them enough for me to feel free to paint adventurously, even rudely and wildly.
It was a mistake not to have rehearsed some poses for them in my head before they came, because I became abashed and did not want to strain their bodies or their patience. I also feel prepared to wait for a while after the drawing session for their meanings, significance, emblems and colours to develop in my imagination.
