The final countdown...

I can’t believe this last week was already the LAST full week of classes of my junior year.  It is crazy to think that next year I will be on my final stretch of classes before student teaching. I am truly excited to get into my career but at the same time its completely nerve wracking to think that pretty soon I’m not going to be a student anymore which is what I have known to be most of my life.

Long Pose

As for that last full wee of class we found ourselves wrapping things up.  Tuesday was a day to fix up manikins and discover what needs to be fixed. Eduardo has a little bit of work and cleaning up yet but I have faith that he will be ready for his final portfolio debut next week. Then on Thursday we worked on a long pose. I was actually really truly pleased with my drawing. I feel like I really got the proportions right. I do wish that I would have gotten a little more time finishing up the face but in general I think it turned out fairly well.  Maybe during our long pose on Tuesday I will get a little more time to work on the face. All and all though I think this semester has been an incredible learning experience and I am excited to tie things up on Tuesday so I can look back and see all of this semester progression.

VIEW PREVIOUS POST FOR FINAL PORTFOLIO (i accidentally made this my last post when adding an image earlier)

Life Drawing 1 = Completed

It’s simply hard to believe that this semester has come to an end. It seems like just yesterday it started. I remember coming into life drawing extremely nervous for the tasks I was to take on, as I had NO idea what to expect.  Of course with time and a wonderful teacher things changed and I think that this class was an incredible experience for me.

In past drawing classes the drawings have always been about shading and contrast for the most part. In this class however we really learned to take on new feats. For instance drawing the gestures of the human body. This is a quick drawing that really makes a person focus on describing what you see in quicker strokes and lines. For me this was probably my biggest challenge through out the whole course. I typically take longer because I like to really study what I am drawing before I make a line but in the case of gesture drawings I really needed to just draw. So hopefully when I take on life drawing II my gesture drawings will get even better. Then there were our contour lines, which we used in some of our longer poses. These are also the lines, which really define the form of the body. Instead of using value or shading to create depth these lines allowed us to show that the object (body) was 3-Dimensional. I really enjoyed using contours especially in my longer poses.

Then there were our mannequins. I named mine Eduardo. The mannequins to me were difficult.  I think I had difficulty translating what muscles I saw in the book onto Eduardo at times. So this was frustrating along with the clay becoming to hot and wanting to stick to everything. However as much as I disliked building Eduardo I also thought that he was important. Becoming aware of the different muscles helped me to understand the body better and also allowed me to represent many of the muscles within some of my longer poses.

So, looking back at my first blog post you can see an extreme difference between now and then. I think that it’s visible that I did learn a lot.  Personally I do feel like I am leaving the class comfortable with the things I have learned and I look forward to exploring and building on these concepts again in Life Drawing 2 next semester.

Here is the link to my final Final Portfolio  

Eyes, nose, and Ears OH MY!

This week we started adding facial features to our skulls. I think this has been the lesson i have been looking forward to all semester. It has also been the hardest lesson for me since starting the some of the earlier features.

Ever since i decided i wanted to be an art teacher i knew that i wanted to be able to draw the face. In my 9th grade Intro to art class our biggest project was to make a self portrait. I remember it was not an easy task but i loved the challenge. I remembered my teacher telling us little pointers on how to draw along the way but i was still not exactly comfortable with  my abilities after leaving the class. So this week was important to me because someday i may end up teaching students how to draw the face and i want to know that i feel comfortable giving them the best possible lesson i can. So, certainly this is week one but i already feel more comfortable with the information i have learned that if i work for it i think i am more prepared to teach that lesson then ever before.

One thing that i really need to focus on is NOT falling into the big eye trap. I already did as we worked on our first full face drawing but Amy helped me see that i had drawn the eyes to big. Psychologically we want to make the eyes big because people are so drawn to this feature but in order to make our figure look more like a person and less like a disney animation its important to represent the eyes appropriately.
So certainly i still have a lot of work ahead of me but i'm hoping that when i turn in my final self-portrait i will have a successful piece to share given what i have learned from class and i will have a piece that blows my 9th grade picture out of the water.

*Images to be added*

Skull week

The skull was the lesson of this week. It was really interesting to finally learn about this part of the body and I actually found it excited because I have been looking forward to being able to add a head to the bodies I have been drawing all semester. So I think this week finally marks the end of my headless sketches!

Back View

Profile

First off this week has me realizing that the skull is not easy to draw. I guess I didn’t realize there were so many landmarks to look for when drawing the skull. Drawing the back of the head is especially difficult I found. It almost starts to look more like a helmet. I think I also found myself having a greater amount of difficulty because I started drawing the back straight on which was something more advanced students do. So, eventually that is something I can attempt but for now the ¾ view is definitely what I am going to stick to. I think it allows me to see the space better and also see where the lines move from a front plane to a side. In general though I hope that I will be able to better understand the skull as we continue working on our skills and moving into the facial features in the next week. 

HANDS!

Drawing of hand based off the Skelton

Unfortunately I had a short week this week. I was not feeling well on Tuesday so I did not attend class. From what I heard though class was interesting that day as Amy taught the class how we should be drawing. Apparently we need to focus more on using our whole arm to draw versus our wrists. So this makes me think of how I was taught to paint. However, I think it will be something I need to get use to as I have been so use to drawing my way for as long as i can remember. 

On Thursday I was thrilled because we finally learned how to draw the hands. I must say I find that the hand are really difficult. Drawing from the skeleton was ok because I basically got to draw what I saw but things changed once I got to the actual model. Part of the problem with my model drawing was I would realize once it was too late that the pose was constantly changing on me. I think it was difficult for my model to keep their hand in the chosen position because their hand was falling asleep and there was nothing to indicate where their hand was. So, I would love to attempt to draw from an actual model again. I feel like if I got a better pose I might be able to focus on the hand drawing more then fixing the fingers that kept moving. I do think that i like drawing the hands though. I like being able to take time to focus on them just like when we did the feet. I do need lots of work on them yet though. 

Oh those arms

This week was another short week. We had advisement day on Tuesday so we didn’t get to nearly as much as we have in other weeks. What I did discover this week is that I still have a lot of improvement I would like to see in myself. I feel like the end of the semester is creeping up on us and I would like to accomplish so much in that time.

This week we continued working on the arms only now we a started working on the lower arms. I discovered that there is a lot of change that can occur just by the changing position which you see the arm. For instance the when you see your arm facing palms up (Supine) versus palms down (Prone) this can completely change how you view the bone structure. Its also interesting to not all of the muscles which we have started building. We started adding some of the extensors and its amazing how some of these muscles as tiny as they are can do so much as help us to move our fingers.

Long pose of the week. 

As I said I want to accomplish a lot. Since I have realized im starting to get the time factor down in gesture drawings I also discovered I need to be adding more things to my gesture drawings such as some of the different muscles we see. So this will slow me down again but I really do need to have a better understanding of where some of the muscles are so it’s going to be a good slow down. Even in the longer poses I am finding some of the muscles to be a challenge for me. I think I need to have a “date” with Eduardo to just observe his muscles again because I think I need to spend more time studying them outside of class. Im really hoping that I can get so much of what I want to do accomplished by the end of the semester. Its seems crazy that there is really just a little more then a moth left and we are done. 

Getting antsy to learn more!

Hi again,

Life drawing this week was focused greatly on the drawing portion of class. Over the past couple weeks we have not gotten to draw as much due to different conflicts that had come in the way so it was nice to be able to take a lot of time to focus on that portion of the class.

1 minute gesture drawings

Personally I was grateful for this time because I started to notice that I think I am getting quicker with my gesture drawings.  I find that I am not fussing with little things slowing me down as much anymore. So, I think I was most proud about that accomplishment this week because I really have been trying to quicken my pace.  I also am glad that we got to do several longer poses as well. On Thursday we even did our longest pose yet as we drew for almost 2 hours! I liked doing longest poses best but I am not as proud of this drawing as I have been with others. I think that my legs start looking a little awkward in the drawing, but I think part of it is the angle I was at too. So hopefully I will feel better about my next long pose. I do think I did a decent job with the muscles in his arm. The pose really allowed me to see the muscles along the underside of his arms so it was a little bit easier to represent then some of the other more hidden muscles.

2 hour pose

I can’t wait to learn more in the upcoming weeks. I’m getting particularly excited to learn about drawing the hands. It seems like in every pose I have I just stop at the wrists because when I attempt drawing that hands they don’t look right at all. In general though I can’t wait to see complete figure in my drawings, so i guess you could say i'm getting a little antsy. 

Time for the Shoulders

This week’s lesson focused on adding the shoulders to our drawings. I discovered that adding the shoulders was rather difficult at first in our gesture drawings. I found myself struggling just to get to the shoulders in our quicker sketches.  Which makes me realize I still need to quicken my pace in my gesture drawings. If I can do this maybe I can actually get my shoulder blades in more easily before in less then two minutes. I do think things are getting better with my gesture drawings though. I noticed that I wasn’t getting stumped on some of the things I was before spring break. Which is a good sign.

Some of the things I found difficult about the shoulders in even the longer poses were seeing such things as the shoulder blades. If the light didn’t hit them just right or the arm was in a position that didn’t make them stick out they were actually rather difficult to find. So in my longer pose I kind of struggled with that but Amy helped me find where they should be. So I think that helped me visualize what I should be looking for. Hopefully with time I will be able to just know where they should be even if I can’t see them very good.

So for this week I decided I would post picture of images I found online dealing with the shoulder. I think by seeing more of these images it will help me when I return to class on Tuesday. 

Foot Week & Spring Break!

Hi again!

Wow, I cannot believe that we are already done with spring break! I think I was certainly at that point of the semester where I needed a little time off from school. It was also nice to be home for more then a few days so that I could spend sometime with my family. I also enjoyed the beautiful weather and found myself completely inspired by surrounding so I took MANY pictures.

As for class before spring break we started learning to draw the foot. I found the foot to be challenging but at the same time I really enjoy drawing feet. I oddly I found that drawing the toes and the bottom side of the foot were my favorite. I guess when it comes to drawing the foot I think it really has its own character. For instance no toe is the same. Some toes are bent while others are straight and some are even hiding behind other toes. I think its is also interesting to think of all the bones and muscles that are in such a small area that together create what we see as the foot. I also think that learning about these bones and muscles really helped me to visualize what I needed to be looking for as I started drawing the foot on this first day. 

Until Next Week, 

Ashley

Mid Semester ALREADY!!!!

Hey Everyone,

Look at the link here to see my Mid semester Portfolio

I find It is so hard to believe that we are already at the mid point in the semester. In this time though i can tell that i have a learned a lot and continue to do so. There is a HUGE difference between my first drawings in this class and the ones from this week.

Anterior View of Eduardo

This weeks 1 Hour Pose

This class has taught me to think about how to draw in new ways. Instead of focusing on contrast, line, and shadow this class is teaching me to represent things with just lines and also using lines to form a 3 dimensional space, as we do in our contour drawings. I also find myself discovering that our mannequins help us to learn how to draw the body as well. The mannequins help me to visualize the certain muscles that can be seen on the outside of the body. I find that every week is a wonderful challenge as there is a new form to learn and represent as we make our way around the body.

Last weeks 1 hour pose

Over the last couple of weeks i have discovered that i find myself most comfortable taking on the longer poses. I have always been one that is patient with my work so i find that the short gesture drawing are a challenge to me. However i see how important the gesture drawings are in order to become more aware and precise at drawing the land marks we are looking for such as the pelvic points. So even though i am most comfortable with taking my time i think the short poses really help as i work my way farther along in drawing the body.



I am truly excited to learn how to properly draw the rest of the body. I also can't wait to be able to look at the progress at the end of the semester. Its amazing the change that i have already seen!

Week 5 time to recap and move forward

Note of the
Frontal view of Pelvis

As a result of a short week last week this week started off recapping some of the things we learned. Which was really good in my case as i couldn't exactly remember how to draw some of the angles of the pelvis. Fortunately i think i'm starting to get it now. The area i was having most difficulty with was understanding how to draw the front view of the pelvis. However now i understand which points i need to look for and things are looking considerable better.

Side View

This week we also worked on adding the femur to our drawings. For my gesture drawings i thing i need to learn to quicken my pace as i sometimes fail to get to this part of the drawing. However we also worked on a longer pose this week. We had an hour long pose and which i really like having the opportunity to do so because it really allowed me to study the things that i don't really get the opportunity to do so in my gesture drawings. One thing that i found difficult with the hour long pose was that after break the some of the things shifted in my picture so i found myself attempting to fix these things longer then i probably should have.
Well, hopefully next week progression will only continue and i can learn to quicken my pace in the gesture drawings. 

Back view

Week 4 was a short week but full of support for our educators.

This week was a short week for us. With the happenings in Wisconsin we took some time out of our class period to go support our public workers, which include our teachers. They put so much time and effort into making sure that we receive a good education that I am so glad that we were given the opportunity to make our voice heard for them. I can only hope that the future of education in Wisconsin is protected and that our Governor reconsiders what he is asking of this select group of people.

In life drawing this week we did do some drawing allowing us to add onto our concepts we have already learned. The week we added on our pelvic region and hips. We discovered how this part of the body looks from each angle.  Personally I think I need to work on this a little more. We didn’t get to spend a lot of time on this region so I think being able to study it more will help me understand the curves of this area from each angle you look at it. 

Can it really be week 3?

Hello again!

Wow, can it really be the end of week 3 already? This is also an exciting thought though since this means that there is also a great deal of progression that is coming along. In life drawing this week we continued to build upon our knowledge of the body with our gesture drawings, contour drawings, as well as learning about the muscles through our sculptures.

Contour Drawing

Gesture Drawing
including the ribcage

I am still learning so much from this class and i can certainly see the progressions from each week but, i still have a long ways to go in my studies of the body. In the drawing aspect of this weeks class we brought into play the rib cage. In our drawings the rib cages is the egg like shape that is found towards the upper area of the vertebrate by the neck. We also worked on more contour drawings which i felt went considerably better this time. I am starting to become more aware of how these kinds of drawings work and i can't wait to see how they progress with the semester. In general i think having the new knowledge of the ribcage this week has helped to develop the idea of space in all of the drawings this week.

Eduardo's new Muscles!

Abs!

Then there is Eduardo. This week he is starting to look more and more human like. Our homework from the week had us studying over the muscles in the abs, glutes, and hips. As the modeling part of our class continues i am discovering that sometimes it is difficult for me to really grasp what the muscles look like. However when I finally get it right it is highly rewarding and i find it to be another tool that will really tie into visualizing what I also see on the outside of the body.

Well i guess that was week 3, 

Ashley

Week 2 and it ends with a little green and yellow.

Hello again,

First off I just have to say GO PACKERS! I'm sure by now you know that they have won the super bowl. So, being a Wisconsin girl I'm pretty thrilled about the victory tonight. 

Beginning to Build Eduardo's muscles. 

Now, as for this past week in life drawing we learned several things. This week we broke down our drawings into specific areas of the body. In this process we continued to work on our contour drawings but this time we only worked on creating parts of the spine. Something important we could take from this lesson is that everything starts here.  Other things we learned were that some of the curves in the spine such as the primary curves, which include the thoracic and sacral, stay the same. Where as such parts of the spine as the cervical & lumbar counter balance the primary curves depending on what the model is doing.

Muscle Progression

We also starting learning about muscles and were given our first assignment to start building some of the muscles in our body. This week we started to focus on the Spinal erectors. So far my skeleton, Eduardo, has only made it into the first part of the assignment. However, I can already tell that building these muscles will help to improve my understanding of the body as a whole. And of course having a better understanding of the body will also allow me to hopefully be able to draw it better since it will allow me to see things on another level.

- Ashley

About Me

Gesture Drawing

Hi, my name is Ashley and I am currently a junior at the University of Wisconsin Stout. I am working towards my degree in Art Education. I’m hoping that someday with my degree I will find a job working as an Art Teacher in a small town elementary school. I love art and working with children, so I am truly excited as I work towards a career that fulfills my enjoyment in both areas. 

I have never blogged before so this is a whole new experience for me. I plan to use my blog as way for me to share what I have learned, experienced, and accomplished as an artist. So, I guess it will act as a type of portfolio in ways with bits of the things that inspire me mixed in. 

Gesture Drawing

This blog will also be used to mark my progress in my life drawing class, which I am taking this semester. The class already excites me after only a couple of days. Drawing itself has always been my favorite art class to take and I love that this class is going to teach me to draw and think in new ways. I also like that the class will give me the opportunity to understand the human body visually, as this is not something I have done in past classes. 

My first attempt at a contour drawing of an arm.

So far in my life drawing class we have started doing gesture drawings and contour drawings of the body, which is something completely different then I am use to. Gesture drawings are where you draw the basic shape of the body with no details. So this is different then my previous drawing classes as we are generally asked to draw things in greater detail. Another unusual aspect about the process we take for these drawings in class is that we are only working on each pose for a set period of time ranging from thirty seconds to five minutes.  We have also worked on contour drawings that were by far the most different and difficult way I have learned to draw so far. This is essentially where you use lines as rings to show the form of the body, as if they were curved around the shape. Since I have never drawn this way before I found it rather difficult but with time I am sure I will learn to understand how this type of drawing works. 

Until Next Time, 

Ashley