Reflection: Looking ahead

As I was making notes for Assignment 2, a few thoughts came to mind about the course in general, and this blog in particular. One of the things I’ve struggled with has been… Continue reading →

Check and log: Drawing animals

What were the main challenges of drawing animals? The main one was not having instant access to any animals, no longer having any pets.  Thankfully, however, we have friends with animals, so relied… Continue reading →

Exercise 34: Fish on a plate

    This isn’t an exercise post, so much as an explanation to the assessors. Being a vegetarian, this was never really going to work. Following contact with the OCA, they said other… Continue reading →

Research point: Anatomy and George Stubbs

This research point is divided into two parts. Firstly, we were asked to look at the skeletal structure of either a horse, dog or cat – I opted for felines as, although I’ve… Continue reading →

Exercise 33: Grabbing the chance

This exercise asked for a series of small sketches of animals. As we no longer have a pet of our own, I made use of some friends cats for several of the sketches,… Continue reading →

Research point: Animals in the Renaissance

Look at how Renaissance masters such as Leonardo da Vinci and Durer depicted animals. The expansive mood of the Renaissance saw a growing emphasis on the secular life.  Art mirrored this, and was… Continue reading →

Check and log: Drawing plants and flowers

  How will your experiments with negative space help your observational drawing in the future? Understanding negative space better greatly increases the amount of information available, so my experiments with it will help… Continue reading →

Exercise 32: Drawing with other colour media

Make some drawings of the same subject as before in other colour media.  Experiment with mixing the media.  Reflect on how the task changes with the different media.  How does the change in… Continue reading →

Exercise 31: Plants and flowers in coloured pencil

As soon as I read the requirements for this drawing, I knew it was likely to be a mighty task. Coloured pencil, control and detail, on an A2 sheet of paper –  it… Continue reading →

Exercise 30: Negative space in a plant

    For this exercise, I used a black marker pen on A3 paper. As directed, I studied the plant carefully, looking at all the space around it and between the stalks and… Continue reading →