PART 1 - Form and Gesture

Exercise 1- warm up, temporary drawings

Below are some photos taken at the beach on an attempt to create some temporary drawings.

In the first one as you can see I made up the letter E using stones of various sizes and colours. Some of the stones stand out better than others, given the background colour of the sand and the direction of the sunlight.

The big spiral shape and straight lines in the sand were made using a small stick that I found on the beach. Having the beach as my canvas I had to think as to what I size I wanted my drawings to be, in order to make them visible and noticeable. It took some effort drawing in the sand as it was very large scale and obviously damp from the sea water !!   I liked the effect of the sand as it 'spilled' over the lines that I drew, as they had now acquired texture and an illusion of movement was created.

Project 1- Feeling and Expression

Exercise 1 - Experimenting with expressive lines and marks

 The following drawings are lines and marks made to express a feeling.

My first drawing was about being calm. I used graphite, conte stick, oil pastel and charcoal.

CALM

While drawing calm  I took my time to draw the lines that I related to that feeling. In my mind's eye, calmness looks and feels like a circle and to me being calm is all about being in control with one's emotions and at peace with one self. That is why I incorporated spiral, curly and curvy strokes in my 'calm' sketches. Both the charcoal and oil stick drawings were a bit more 'intense' in terms of value, whereas the graphite and conte stick were a bit 'softer' and better associated with the feeling of being calm.

My second drawing was about joy. I used graphite, ink, charcoal and conte stick.

JOY

To me the feeling of joy is all about being happy and feeling 'high'. When I am joyful I feel a bit like singing and dancing or jumping up and down with excitement!! I resembled joy by drawing lines that started at the bottom and pointed upwards  with  a slight curve facing to the right, a bit like springing forward or looking optimistically ahead as a result of feeling joyful, (whereas if the top of the lines faced to the left, I would associate that with looking back towards the past!! I noticed that I drew the lines about joy a bit faster than the calm ones!

My third drawing was about anger. I used oil stick, ink, compressed charcoal and conte stick.

ANGER

When I get angry it feels as thought I am in a 'dark' place or having a dark cloud following me and I feel all muddled up inside. I used conte, oil stick, charcoal and ink as they can produce really dark values, a bit like a stormy cloud! I found the ink the hardest to spread with the ink pen and so I resorted to using a sponge to help disperse it across the paper. The feeling of anger is very intense and 'concentrated' which is why I tended to draw a 'pool' of darkness. I didn't like drawing the feeling of anger, but I can see how it can help create very dark, moody and intense drawings. I don't think using graphite or drawing thin, scattered lines would have had the same effect on portraying the feeling of anger as accurately.

My fourth and final drawing was about feeling sad. I used oil stick, ink, charcoal and conte stick.

SADNESS

Sadness is about feeling low or feeling 'flat' or 'numb'; a bit like the flat line of a electrocardiogram or like fading away in the background while being consumed with negative feelings..... I noticed that I started drawing my lines from the top and then pointing or spiralling down. I used fainted lines to depict the feeling of 'fading away' and in my ink drawing I added some ink spots to resemble tears. I also drew a flat, horizontal block of black colour with a conte stick to show how sadness brings things to a standstill.