male study

This was done in red pastel pencil on light green Hanemuhle Ingres paper.

master copies

Master copies are an excellent way to learn mark making and line quality. These are drawings from Annibale Carracci. He was an absolute master of very sensitive figure drawings made with red chalk (as these were) and black chalk. I love the open line work and found when copying them that they sometimes followed the individual muscular forms and sometimes just went straight across multiple forms. The latter seemed to be used to create a particular value across a broad area. As a general rule it seemed the lines were delicate and sensitive always, even when they became a little thicker and darker. For both of these studies I prepared Rives BFK white paper with a wash of burnt umber water color and drew with cretacolor sanguine lead.

reclining male nude

This drawing is done in vine charcoal on Zerkall Ingres Sand colored paper. This was about a 15 session pose with each session taking 3 hours.

female nude

This is a figure drawing I finished this afternoon. It is vine charcoal on Zerkall Ingres, Sand colored paper. This was a 17 session pose and each session was 3 hours. In the last session I worked real hard on the face to attempt a reasonable likeness and bring it to a finish on par with the rest of the figure. It's amazing how hard it is to really get a likeness. And it is doubly hard to really capture the character of a person.