Category Archive: Uncategorised

This week I ‘m encouraging everyone to use a coloured or grey A2 paper or to pick up a different drawing medium to that used so far. There are plenty to choose from; charcoal, ink, pastel or conte crayon etc. Coloured, grey or even black paper can help you think in different ways about tone; using the paper as a mid tone for example or working on black paper where the artist supplies the mid and pale tones.

The following images were all drawn on white paper using a variety of media.

The subject is the same as last week, any small natural form that has to be greatly enlarged to fill an A2 or even A1 sized paper.

Your Drawings;

This weeks challenge will be to draw a more challenging form. The drawings should show the three dimensional form of your chosen object and also communicate surface structures and patterns with mark making.

Barnacles on a simple sea shell like a limpet as in the photos above and below would be an interesting choice as you can home in on just one barnacle or the whole limpet shell with it’s whole population of barnacles.

Another choice might be a small pine cone or a detail of a large one. I have included my crib sheet to help with drawing various natural forms at the end of this post. They are all drawn at a tiny scale and your challenge as last week is to fill a sheet at least A2 in size with your tiny object.

Another idea would be a skeletonised seed head or twig where the structures usually hidden below the surface are revealed.

Lastly, bones can also make very interesting subjects and the series of photos below show the same vertebra from a species of fish with dorsal spines seen from different angles. Information on the fish would be much appreciated! The viewpoint of the object you choose to draw will be very important this week. You may even like to do a series of drawings of the same object over the next two weeks.

Your Drawings;

All on A2 paper

Last week we looked at small but sculptural forms and how to make them look three dimensional. This week we’ll look at flatter or low relief forms with a view to depicting their character by mark making and line.

Look for an axis or a point from which a pattern of lines or curves radiate outwards and indicate this on your paper. Look for, in the case of a leaf as above, the point from which the veins radiate and draw them with regard for the angles between them.

To ensure your drawing is large enough make sure that at its widest and highest points these touch the sides of the imaginary rectangle enclosing the whole form. Best to do as last week and draw this rectangle feintly on your paper. Most natural forms are not completely symmetrical, nor will the point from which, as in the Ivy leaf above, will the point from which the veins radiate be necessarily the lowest point of your drawing even if the stalk is missing.

Leaves of course take many shapes, and the arrangement of veins may be along a central axis as in the holly leaf at the end of this post. Once you have drawn the main shapes of you object and added some tone where needed, you can then come to grips with the fun part, hopefully loads of interesting mark making. As ever practice various marks on some spare paper, on the bare paper and over areas of tone. Sometimes it can give a soft effect to tone the paper by light hatching over marks.

Try making dull marks with a blunt or rounded stick or pencil. Also try making well defined marks with a very sharp pencil or by either sharpening a stick of your medium to give a sharp edge. Keep a small piece of sandpaper handy for this. How much you suggest surface textures and patterns and how much you copy faithfully from the object is very much your choice and will depend on whether you wish to create an impression of the object’s character or go for ultimate realism.

Here are a few more photos of the sort of reference suitable for this week’s challenge.

Your Drawings: All on A2 paper

This is the first of four posts about drawing objects larger than life.  As a former biologist I have always been amazed at the variety of structures and textures to be found in the natural world and had the opportunity to study their fine detail. However it is just as important with small things to start drawing their general shape and form in the same way as you might begin a drawing of a much larger object. I have chosen four examples see photographs below, which would lend themselves to being drawn much larger than life size. This week they are forms that have a very sculptural feel to them and the aim will be to depict their three dimensional form.

It may be helpful to reference the drawings of walnut halves by the sculptor Peter Randall Page link to his website below;

https://www.peterrandall-page.com/drawings/walnut-i-xii-2/

Many of his drawings are over 1 metre in size.

We are so used to scaling down to draw from the landscape or whole human form that it is quite a challenge to draw something tiny  between about 2 and 10 cm on its longest side on a large sheet of paper.  Ideally I would like you to work on an A2 sheet but absolutely no smaller than A3.

Once an object has been chosen, spend some time examining it from several angles. Think about its overall dimensions and when you have decided on a view to draw mark out a rectangle on the paper that its sides will just touch. This will help you place the object on the page and also indicate the size at which you will be drawing.

You may like to hold the object in your hand but if working at an easel I generally prefer to attach the object to a piece of paper and work with it on or beside my drawing paper. Try to ensure this is at a comfortable place for you to observe and then draw and minimise any change of direction of your gaze every time you look back from your drawing to the object and back again. You should, especially in the early stages of the drawing spend mire time looking than drawing. Masking tape or Blu-tak is usually sufficient to anchor a small object unless it is very heavy like a fossil or stone.

Choose drawing media according to the size of the paper support and the kinds of mark you wish to make. For instance you may like to start drawing very broadly with a graphite stick or chunky charcoal for the overall shape and tone and then go in with a smaller form of the medium, graphite pencil or thinner charcoal or charcoal pencil for more detailed work. If you have any you could also experiment with coloured graphite and/or coloured charcoal sticks and pencils. Another good choice would be conte crayon that you can use on its side like a pastel or make strokes with the end. Conte crayon is harder than most pastels but is chalky and can be moved a little on the support. All these media can also be brushed with water but as always, it is advisable to experiment first on a separate paper before using on the final drawing.

Some forms will have a definite axis as in the Physalis above. In this case the axis of stalk to tip is curved and proves a useful anchor for your drawing. The nectarine also has an axis but it is much more asymmetrical. However all the pits and furrows relate to this axis.

Once you have established the general shape and form of the object you can start to home in on some of its detail. In the nectarine stone this may be the contours of the pits and furrows on its surface. With the Physalis lantern, after establishing the main shape and tones between the main veins, this will probably be indicating the smaller veins with more linear marks and looking at some of the smaller changes in tone within each section.

With other objects like the shell with barnacles below, try sketching in the main shape and then look for the curved ridges on this little oyster’s weathered shell. Many of these are hidden by the barnacles that populate its surface. These ridges represent growth spurts and centre on the narrower end of the shell where it is covered by the pot shaped barnacles. Where there are few clues to the underlying structure just map out the main areas and work tonally. In the case of the shell below imagine or even draw in lightly the surface the barnacles are sitting on before drawing them. Note the other textures and structures on the surface and decide whether or not they are relevant to the drawing. The amount of detail as in every drawing is the artist’s decision.

Your Drawings: All drawings on A2 paper unless caption reads differently

This week’s challenge is to draw or paint a quirky building. The only definition I can give is that it should be a building you find strange, amusing or eccentric. One example that I could not resist is above. As the road name suggests this little lane does indeed coil round and ends so that you are forced to retrace your steps to exit. There is also a sheer drop on the other side of the house.

Below is a house that at first sight looks pretty conventional till you notice the bricked up windows and the fact that there is a strange attachment to the house next door and a very tall chimney.

When you see the rear it appears to be a very strange house indeed.

I kept wondering what was beyond the mysterious white door beside the steps! Was this part of the original house before the extension and concrete steps were added?

I wonder what you will find for this challenge?

My demonstration will be from one of the images above.

Remember the basic observation of perspective is just as important this week. Also you may have to deal with shapes that are far from square and conventional, so imagining how the structure is in three dimensions may help with your drawing. If you can, choose a building you know, and have seen from several viewpoints.

Your paintings:

This week we’ll consider a single building, a theatre, church, castle, or a mosque, in use or ruined, that has a particular appeal to you. It is always best to choose a place you know, have walked around, hopefully sketched and photographed as you will have a memory of how it felt to be there not just the nuts and bolts of the structure.

Just a few of the many ways artists have tackled buildings can be seen at the Pinterst Board below

https://www.pinterest.co.uk/jhall1282/buildings-in-art/culturalcommunity-buildings/

It includes Impressionist paintings, works by John Piper and also by the contemporary artist David Tress and a few others. These artists use both different materials and different approaches to painting architecture. Perhaps try making several sketches from your reference and while you are drawing think about what you want to communicate about the place.

Is it the architectural details that interest you and how much should you include? Are you excited by the textures and patterns or graffiti on the walls. Do you want to suggest the mood or time of day with the lighting and colour? What do you feel about this building; is it joyful and uplifting or sad and lonely. Are you overwhelmed by it’s size etc. How much of its surroundings will you include and/or do you wish to paint only part of the building?

By making these initial sketches, especially if you have references from different viewpoints of the same building, you will also familiarise yourself with all it shapes and angles and become much more aware of how it is constructed. Last week’s session should help with this.

If you have time look at the many paintings Monet made of Rouen Cathedral at different times of day. Enjoy looking at more works by John Piper and David Tress and then set about your own building work! Have fun!

Your paintings:

The Importance of Viewpoint

This week we explore looking at buildings with regard to the artists viewpoint.

First look at the Pinterest board at:

https://www.pinterest.co.uk/jhall1282/buildings-in-art/town-square-or-street/

Think about the viewpoint from which these works were made. Was the artist looking up at or down on the street. Also look at whether the scene is on level ground or a slope. What happens to the horizontal structures e.g. window ledges and door lintels in relation to the ground when the buildings are on a slope?

In drawing a straight street it may be useful to understand how single point perspective works. Where a group of buildings or single buildings are being drawn it is also useful to come to grips with two point perspective. In many situations where buildings are at different angles to each other measurement or estimating the relative sizes of the forms becomes increasingly important. The following diagrams describe how the most basic forms of perspective work.

Single point perspective: If perfectly parallel rows of houses are situated facing a road that is also perfectly straight it would be perfectly feasible to draw construction lines as guides for the drawing which employ the use of single point perspective.

However streets have a tendency to bend and buildings are not always built at Only straight sections lend themselves to this approach. New vanishing points have to be constructed for every bend in the road.

Because buildings are often on streets that bend, and built at different angles to each other, you will often have to resort to measuring the main heights and widths of the large shapes and then home in on how best to draw the smaller details.

Two point perspective: Sometimes where one building dominates the scene an idea of how two point perspective works will give a starting point from where you can estimate and or measure the rest. Below are diagrams that will help you analyze what is happening when a building is seen from below, from a slightly higher elevation and from a point above the building.

Understanding how perspective works will help you sort out the drawing if something looks out of place, and will supply you with some tools to make necessary adjustments with individual buildings and with some street scenes. More often buildings are not at convenient angles to each other and it will be your skills in observing, making actual or mental measurements (estimations of relative sizes and angles) that will be most useful for drawing clusters of houses. The best way to learn is by sketching wherever possible on site (the best way), or from photographic reference. Continually ask yourself questions about relative heights and widths and angles.

When things get very complicated as when looking across at a sea of dwellings just enjoy the pattern of shapes and colours and have fun with them.

This week: choose to paint a rather straight street of regular houses or a single building or group of buildings in which one building dominates. Think about how single and two point perspective can help in constructing the drawing and/or help you check your preliminary drawing before developing the work further. Alongside this think hard about how important a part measuring dimensions and angles will be.

Your Paintings:

This is the first of four drawing and painting challenges looking at different aspects of drawing and painting buildings in towns and villages. Have a look at the Pinterest Board;

https://www.pinterest.co.uk/jhall1282/buildings-in-art/shop-fronts/

You will find a varied selection of works of bar and shop fronts from painterly works by Maurice Utrillo, Edward Hopper, Stephen Magzig and Brett Amory to the illustrative and very graphic coloured drawings by the contemporary artist Eleanor Crow. Not included are the wonderful drawings of Lucinda Rogers; well worth Googling!

A study of a shop is a well defined subject and seen from front on there is little perspective to worry about so it may thought to be an easy place to start.  However there are still a lot of composition choices to make and of course some perspective issues as with with a corner shop, for instance.  The photo references below have been chosen to illustrate just some of these choices.

Over all composition: It is very much the artist’s choice what to include of adjacent buildings and also how much of the building above the shop front and how much of the pavement or road outside the store. 

Tone: look at the dark areas. If a shop has an awning, what is below may be very shadowed. Doorways are often in slight alcoves and relatively dark. Really look at the pattern of light and dark across your reference sketch or photo. There may also be significant cast shadows. Contrasts of tone will be much greater on sunny days while cloudy days result in rather flat lighting so communicating this will give your work the atmosphere of the day, as well as depicting the objects.

Some of the most fun to paint are stores where the produce spills out over on to the pavement like a rather complicated still life and/or when the seller can be seen. I think of these shops as halfway to being a market.

Whether and which street furniture to include; street lamps, waste bins, newspaper stands, traffic lights and other street signs etc.

People and traffic; decisions on whether to include pedestrians and window shoppers and parked bikes or vehicles.

Store signage, lettering, closed and open signs and how much detail to include of the wares on show.

Deciding on the detail of lettering is another choice but it should be in keeping with the rest of the work. If you are a calligrapher this will come easily to you. If not and you wish to make very careful lettering or even rather free lettering don’t be afraid to get a ruler out just so that you keep your lettering or scribble to the right height. If you are working the rest of the painting quite loosely it is usually best to work such details in the same way. Remember that loose does not mean inaccurate so be aware of the relative sizes of windows, doors,etc. and always remember to check the verticals.

Next week we will look a little at perspective, measuring and estimating by eye. This week should give you a good feel for looking at relative proportions and thinking about composing from your reference.

Your Drawings and Paintings;

This week’s challenge is to draw or paint the whole figure of a child, a child with another child, or a parent and child study. If you are fairly new to drawing I would advise drawing a single figure for your painting and to practice making as many small sketches of children whether from life or from photographs as you can, to train your eye to be accustomed to the fact that children’s heads are larger in proportion to their height than adult heads.

When painting young children either standing or involved with some activity it is useful to drop a perpendicular line from the highest point on your reference to work out the proportions of the body and the angles that the shoulders, hips and limbs and their relative lengths. Also put a perpendicular on your drawing paper. Some measuring will help you to see and draw taking into account any foreshortening that may occur as when an arm is pointing directly at you! If you prefer to draw completely freehand before painting, check the accuracy of your drawing by dropping a perpendicular from the same point as done for your reference.

As always also look for any clues from negative spaces that will help you get the proportions and lengths right.

With clothed figures, especially full skirts and baggy trousers try to imagine the limbs beneath them and their relation to the spine. Look at whether one shoulder is higher than the other and how this works in relation to the neck.

The little sketch above is of six year old Toby balancing on a wobble board. Note how in the figure on the left both feet are bearing some of his weight and if a line is dropped from his neck it would fall between the two feet. In the figure on the right most of his weight is on his right foot (left in the image) and a line dropped from his neck shows the neck to be positioned directly above the load bearing foot. Try to draw simple line drawings from life or ‘photos of standing children standing with the load shared between their feet, and also where the load is mainly on one foot. Then try to draw some children in the same way when they are actively engaged in a sporting or other activity where they are in motion.

If you have the opportunity and wish to draw a group of children together especially where their forms overlap, treat the group as one whole shape before homing in on the individuals. Work lightly at first so that you can adjust as you look at your subject more critically as the drawing progresses. Lastly make sure you take more time looking than drawing so that all the main shapes are correct before committing yourself to painting.

In the initial stages of painting look very critically at the direction of the light and how this affects the tones that reveal the form of the child. Look also at how light can affect the darkest local colours, for example even a black T-shirt can appear quite pale on the side that is turned toward the light but retain its dark appearance where turned away from the light source.

Lastly look at shadows cast by the child’s form; e.g. a shadow of the head falling on to the child’s neck and shoulder; shadows below the feet which will help anchor the figure to the ground; and in some cases the shadow of the whole figure against the ground or cast on a wall etc.

For examples of drawing and painting children look at the Pinterest Board below:

https://www.pinterest.co.uk/jhall1282/portraits/babies-and-young-children/

Your Paintings:

This week the challenge is to draw or paint a young child’s head in profile and/or full face. The features especially the chin and nose begin to show the character they will gradually develop into later. While it is often very difficult to identify and adult from a new baby photo it becomes slightly easier from the age of two or three.

Some wonderful examples can be seen on Jo’s Pinterest board at;

https://www.pinterest.co.uk/jhall1282/portraits/young-children-heads/

Your drawings and paintings:

This week we’ll consider making a painting or drawing a whole baby and suggest your subject is no more than one year old, or perhaps a better guideline would be between newborn and crawling, but not yet walking.

Babies have a tendency to thrash their limbs about when awake so it is often easier to work from photos but if you have a resident crawler, or baby that is starting to support himself do try and sketch from life, even if all that is achieved is a few hasty lines. This will help your observation and visual memory enormously.  It will also help you to identify errors in more considered drawings at a very early stage.

However the easiest way with babies is to draw them while sleeping!

Do have a look at some of last week’s references again and perhaps practise drawing a few baby feet!

https://www.pinterest.co.uk/jhall1282/portraits/babies-and-infants-drawing-tips/

https://www.pinterest.co.uk/jhall1282/portraits/babies-and-young-children/

If you you would like to why not try a parent or even a grandparent and baby painting. Mary Cassatt painted many of these and a few examples can be found at:

https://www.pinterest.co.uk/jhall1282/portraits/baby-and-parent/

Your paintings:

Over the next four weeks we’ll look at drawing and painting babies and young children, looking at infant heads the first week then whole baby forms and go on to consider toddlers and young children to about four years old for the second two sessions.  With drawing and painting babies and children the structures and tones need the same attention as in other portrait studies but an additional challenge is the soft touch needed to convey the softness and delicacy of children’s skin both with the tones and the colour.

Pastel, pencil, charcoal and watercolour will be used for the demonstrations but you are welcome to work in your preferred medium.

Drawing baby heads.

The facial features and skulls of babies are not fully developed and their proportions are different from adult heads.  The facial features are smaller in regard to the space they occupy and only the iris of the eye is fully developed giving many babies that cute large eyed look.  The nose being of cartilage grows at a different rate to the bone of most of the skull and at the baby stage the nose is often slightly upturned.  The eyebrows are relatively lower than for an adult and the chin is smaller and tucked in so that it protrudes rather less than the lips.

1.  Find a photograph of a baby’s face that is looking straight toward the camera and work out the proportions of the face from the tip of the chin to the top of the head.  If you can see them also note the position of the top and bottom of the ears.

2. Do the same for a baby’s head seen in profile and also work out how the ears are positioned.

3. Draw and/or paint a baby’s head from your own reference.  Note whether the features lie on a curve if the head is looking up or down and pay special attention to how the proportions of the various elements change.  For example if the head is viewed from slightly below, more of the chin will be seen compared to the forehead and top of the head. 

As with adults the eyes will be about one eye width apart.  Unlike adults the baby nose and chin are shorter.  As with everything when you are making a representative drawing draw what you see not what you believe to be there.

Next week we will consider the whole baby figure.  However babies often play with their hands, sucking thumbs and chewing fingers, so also try to have a look at baby hands for this week’s session.

Some useful references can be found on the following Pinterest boards.

The first board (below) has useful guides to the proportions of infant to adult figures and also to drawing baby and toddler heads, hands and feet.

https://www.pinterest.co.uk/jhall1282/portraits/babies-and-infants-drawing-tips/.

The second board (below) has a large collection of paintings and drawings of babies and young children. Some of these are simply beautiful studies. Others as in the Leonardo references at the end give information on the foetus before birth, and the drawings by Kathe Kollwitz give an idea of the plight of mothers and young children dispossessed by war and deprivation. Think about the study you wish to make, the character and mood of the child and circumstance. This will lead you to create a very personal work.

/https://www.pinterest.co.uk/jhall1282/portraits/babies-and-young-children/

First it is good to make as many drawings as you can from life and photographs to give you a good understanding of the structures and enable you to be more credibly creative. The blog posts will mainly feature drawing and colour will be demonstrated during the practical sessions. Do send a drawing or finished painting for review this week, and any work made during the session will be posted for review the following week.

Your finished drawings or paintings:

Jackson Pollock quote:

« One day, a critic wrote that my works didn’t have a starting point or an end. He wasn’t looking to pay me a compliment but he did”, said the artist.

It is no surprise that some of the most famous artists with abstraction as the greater part of their work are either musicians or have both a passion for and knowledge of music.  It is after all the most abstract of the arts and has a huge power to communicate emotion from laughter to despair.

Colour and music

These include; Rothko, Kandinsky, Klee, Mondrian, Pollock.  Individual works are often described as sorrowful, rhythmic, playful, loud, adjectives you could just as easily use for music.  Several worked in an abstract style with the conscious intent of finding in art and equivalent language to music.  Klee likened the colours in a paint box to musical notes.  Kandinsky heard colours.  When he saw yellow he heard the exuberance of the trumpet. Pollock’s action paintings are full of the rhythm of his movements as he dripped his paint.  Some of Klee’s works appear as symbols on lines almost resembling staves.  Kandinsky used musical terms such as Improvisation, composition, fugue when assigning titles to his works.  Klee’s most abstract grid paintings contained variations on a theme; rows of different hues would be reversed or more subtly changed to create movement.

Think of music that makes you feel; sad, happy, relaxed, excited, thoughtful, serene etc.

What colours do you associate with these?

Practical

Look at works by Jackson Pollock, Lee Krasner, Mark Rothko, Patrick Heron and William Baziotes

https://www.pinterest.co.uk/jhall1282/abstraction/jackson-pollock/

https://www.pinterest.co.uk/jhall1282/abstraction/lee-krasner/

https://www.pinterest.co.uk/jhall1282/abstraction/mark-rothko/

https://www.pinterest.co.uk/jhall1282/abstraction/patrick-heron/

https://www.pinterest.co.uk/jhall1282/abstraction/william-baziotes/

Then use line and/or colour to make a work with a definite emotion in mind.  This may be inspired by a piece of music, person or experience.  It may be an emotion in the sense of sad, happy etc. or the thrill of a roller coaster, exhaustion after running, any experience that you feel inspired to translate into colour and/or line.

The Action painters like Pollock made a start and added each step intuitively. It is for you to choose whether to plan or just to start and see where you pencil or brush leads you. Music is useful as it has a rhythm that can be expressed by line. Try experimenting with music mimicking the rhythm first with a broad brush and then on the same paper with a narrow brush or a rigger. If you are feeling less brave try pencil or crayon.

During the session we will do short exercises exploring how different lines and colours can express very different emotions, followed by developing  one of the resulting drawings as a more considered work.

Have the following ready ;

Inexpensive A4 paper (cartridge or copier paper); a soft pencil or dark coloured pencil; a dark or bright wax crayon; your choice of medium and an appropriate support for developing the painting inspired by your drawing. 

Your paintings:

Starting an abstract painting from observation or memory is something we looked at in passing when considering Paul Klee’s abstractions of the landscape and towns of Tunisia. Although many of these were based on loose grids they never lost sight of some of the motifs he saw. They were however considerably transformed.

Here are a few ideas you may like to explore this week. Choose just one and work on some of the planning ahead of next week’s session. Each one could constitute a sizeable project. Links to reference artists on my Pinterest boards are given in the text.

1.Simplifying a direct Observation or using a loose Grid

Find a landscape or building reference sketch (preferably) or photograph and work on simplifying the shapes till the identity of the place is considerably reduced. The final work should remind you of the place but should be far from a highly representational picture. The colours and scale of the parts may be changed but do not have to be. Figures or animals inhabiting the landscape should be be simplified in the same way and where there are groups of figures try representing them as one shape. If you didn’t make a grid composition in Week 1 that may be a good thing to try this week.

2. A Closer Look

Abstract shapes can often be found by looking closer; at natural forms where surface patterns emerge in minute detail and at reflections in water. This can be pretty much direct observation but the images can appear totally divorced from the bigger picture and painted as pure pattern and shape. Below are a few photographic details from the landscape.

3. Memory

You could make an abstract painting based on a memory of a place or experience. Memories are often charged with emotion as well as being a visual mental record. The former was hugely important to Kandinsky and we will discuss that further during the last session when we take a brief look at abstract expressionist painters so you may like to leave this one till Week 4.

Kandinsky’s path to abstraction was rooted in love for his native Russia; village life, Moscow and the folk lore. Many of his earlier works show this vividly and the accent on colour and mood was clear. He heard sounds when he saw colour. For Kandinsky yellow was an exuberant trumpet and later in life he designed ballet sets for for Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition. It is no surprise that some of his works were also titled in musical terms like Improvisation, Composition Fugue etc but there was also Deluge, …. and other exciting works that stemmed from different experiences.

https://www.pinterest.co.uk/jhall1282/abstraction/wassily-kandinsky/

4. Still Life

William Scott painted abstracted still life subjects reducing them to their bare essentials and playing with perspective. Far simpler than cubist paintings you may like to work in a similar way to Scott or emulate a cubist painting with a simple set up of your own objects

https://www.pinterest.co.uk/jhall1282/abstraction/william-scott/

5. Figures and Animals; simplification

If you would prefer to work from figures or animals look at Picasso’s drawings showing a bull in a series of works in which the bull is reduced to very basic shapes.

https://www.pinterest.co.uk/jhall1282/abstraction/picasso/

Kandinsky made some drawings of a dancer reduced to geometric curves and angular lines. The lines and arcs described her movement as she danced. In the absence of a live model similar schematic drawings could be made photographs of ballet dancers, judo fights,or footballers etc.

https://www.pinterest.co.uk/jhall1282/abstraction/wassily-kandinsky/

A group of drawings could be put together so that that the lines overlapped or drawings could be made from groups of footballers or rugby players interacting. It would be easiest to design the work first then transfer it to the support for painting. You may also like to work out which lines would be the thickest and if colour was used to which areas it should be applied and how.

6. Contour and blind contour drawing

If you have any rapid sketches of birds, animals or plant forms from life you can use their shapes and rearrange them to form an interesting pattern that can be blocked in initially with flat colour. This becomes even more interesting where shapes overlap and you could work with transparent colour to show this or by changing the tone or colour of opaque paint.You could also make some blind contour drawings and use them in the same way. These are made by looking at the subject while you are drawing but not looking at your paper.

Your paintings:

Chance and Recycling

Jean Arp, one of the leading artists of the Dada movement used chance for several of his works. He tore up papers and collaged them where they fell. Some of the works appear too ordered for this to have been the whole story and I suspect he may have put some torn shapes into a hat or equivalent and placed them on the support intuitively as each was drawn out of the hat in a random sequence. He also tore up a woodcut made in 1920 into several pieces and rearranged them on a support in 1954. For Arp this was the artwork. For us it may be or it may be that such methods could be employed as the starting points for developing an abstract painting.

You could certainly do this with a failed painting or with a copy of a suitable good drawing or painting. The pieces could be cut into regular pieces and rotated till you felt a successful arrangement had been achieved or you could shuffle them and place them in a grid in the order that you drew them out. You are in charge of whether to work mainly with chance or mainly with design and whether to develop the work further by adding other media.

The pieces could also of course be dropped on the support and glued where they fell. If a collage was not required it would be easy to make a series of photographs of several dropping events with pieces from the same art work. The resulting photographs might suggest an interesting painting or be art works in their own right separately or collectively. Old greetings cards, magazine pages etc. could be similarly recycled.

Exploring Negative Shapes

The technique below can be as designed, intuitive or suggested by a natural form as you wish. Anything from geometric shapes to tea cups or branching trees can be fun to investigate. They can remain as flat areas of colour or be blended for some great intertwining effects.

The paint left on your palette;

At the end of a painting session it is all too easy just to slide unused paint into a trash can or let it congeal uselessly on the palette. Why not just get a brush or palette knife and spread it almost without thinking on to a sheet of thick card or paper. (you are also allowed the think about it but not with the aim of making it look like a tree or a bird or a flower.) It may do but don’t intend it. It may turn out that it is your first Colour Field work! But my guess is that it may need further development.

Abstract Expressionists are subdivided into two groups of rather different artists

The Action Painters such as Jackson Pollock

https://www.pinterest.co.uk/jhall1282/abstraction/jackson-pollock/

and the Colour Field Painters such as Mark Rothko, Clyfford Still, Barnett Newman.

https://www.pinterest.co.uk/jhall1282/abstraction/colour-field-artists/

Although never listed with these American artists perhaps Patrick Heron should be included here for his colourful gouache paintings.

https://www.pinterest.co.uk/jhall1282/abstraction/patrick-heron/

Practical:Our next practical session will involve using chance, recycling and intuition for beginning an abstract painting or drawing.

Choose to work on one or more of the following;

Aim to have a drawing/painting copy or original to cut or tear up, perhaps a large magazine image. It does become more personal to use your own drawing though. You will also need a support for painting on and your usual paints.

1.Old drawing/painting: either cut up and rotate pieces till they make an interesting arrangement or shake and draw randomly from a container laying them in a grid one by one in the same order that they are drawn out. You may collage the pieces and work over them with more paint or drawing or photograph/trace them and use the image as the basis for your painting.

2. Chance; dropping cut or torn paper on to a support, spatter with paint, remove the paper when all is dry and develop the painting intuitively.

3. Recycled paint; Use what is left on your palette by just painting it out on to a piece of card or paper, perhaps with some intent like putting the pale colours in the middle or the brightest colours in the middle or irregular bands of colour, varying the sizes of colour patches ( this happens naturally as more of some colour than others remain). Colour mixing also happens depending on the mixes on the palette and how much they become blended as they are painted out. This should be done prior to the session so that the development process can take place at next week’s session.

Your paintings;

These are the results from everyone painting or drawing at Hurley in very different weather conditions from the previous week, while I visited all the drawing locations and took a few photos plus made the briefest of sketches. The view of Harleyford Manor was painted in 2000 from location sketches and was about 27 inches wide so a bit large to paint on site!

Your paintings:

Why would any one paint an abstract work?

The fast answer is to express an idea, an emotion or reaction without direct reference to tangible objects.

The reality is that many abstract paintings do reference recognisable things but they are significantly transformed. Given that in painting objects are already transformed from three dimensions to two it does not seem surprising that abstract art at its purest has no relation to objects but that there is a continuum from highly representational art at one end, to paintings with simplified or altered forms, and at the other end more radical abstraction where the shapes whether organic or geometric bear no relation to objects.

However being set free from objects does allow the artist to express mood with colour, with jagged or smoothe lines, slow or fast lines, lines made slowly, hesitantly or at speed, or shapes that are geometric or organic with hard or soft edges.

The most useful analogy is with music, the most abstract of the arts. It is not surprising that many artists have written on this subject. Music can be described as joyful, frivolous, melancholy, sublime, romantic, loud, soft, tender. So it is expressive without direct reference to objects.

What else? Various kinds of music have different rules within which they are made made; scale, rhythm, pattern, variation etc.

Music is created by a composer and interpreted by musicians so that the often written score/composition can be made audible.

Any composition will be a result of the composer’s imagination, intuition and skill within the rules of his/her musical culture and that culture will develop as the composer’s thought processes discover new ways, new rules etc. only limited by his/her imagination and will to experiment.

Music has an audience which receives and interprets the music. Painting has an audience that similarly receives and interprets. Figurative (representational) art works can be appreciated for their skill, the stories they tell, and often evoke an emotional response. They obey rules to varying degrees; of perspective, tone, and shape of the objects within a composition.

Music does this without reference to objects, though natural sounds, of the cuckoo, for instance may be incorporated into the music. The artist may also wish to produce works which rely less on the appearance of objects, producing expressive works freed from tangible subject matter.

In this way Paul Klee described a paint box as the artist’s equivalent to a keyboard. He is deserving of study as possibly more than any artist Klee investigated the processes behind making abstract and imaginative works which may start with an idea or observation but do not have to. One can institute rules for development of the work or work very intuitively and over the next four weeks we will scratch the surface of some of these ideas.

The practical challenge for this week;

Reference the works of Paul Klee on the Pinterest Board at:

https://www.pinterest.co.uk/jhall1282/abstraction/paul-klee/

and Piet Mondrian at

https://www.pinterest.co.uk/jhall1282/abstraction/mondrian/

Make your own rules and then create two or three small paintings with expressive colours to set the mood of each. The paintings may be as small as 6 x 6 inches if working in gouache or watercolour, and larger if working in acrylic and all should be variations using the same rules. You may of course work larger if you prefer.

Make your own rules and write them down, or use one of the suggestions below;

1.Work with a grid however loose or tight and use colour and texture to suggest a remembered place or event.

2.Make a square or rectangle. Fill it with the same geometric shape at different sizes. They may overlap and be at any orientation. Colour using a limited palette or shades of one colour.

3.Fill a rectangle or square with groups of parallel straight lines at various angles to each other. Each line should meet another line at each end. No lines should extend the whole length or width of the rectangle or square. Fill the shapes with a harmonious colour scheme except for one complementary area. Reference Klee’s work ” Forest Architecture” or “Castle to be built in the Forest”.

4. Similar to 3. but the lines may be curved

Use colour to set the atmosphere/mood of each painting. Your own rules may include using different organic shapes connected by lines or shapes or shapes that are enclosed or partly enclosed by other shapes. The possibilities are endless. After a few quick doodles go for one set of rules and stick to it.

During the practical session we will review the work and look at more intuitive starting points and how these can be developed.

Your paintings;

With just an hour till coffee time everyone set about painting a watercolour sketch of the Thames at Hurley. This is a challenging task at this time of year, busy with all sorts of boats from motor cruisers to kayaks. There was always the option to finish at home or stay a little longer to complete the work or make another painting.

Because of the complexities of boat shapes this challenge necessitated considerable simplification of the shapes and a critical view of the tones. When you add in the fact that many of the boats were moving one can understand wanting to finish at home perhaps referencing a ‘photo. This is OK but there are a few pitfalls.

1.Always take the shot at the eye height you were drawing at. There is often the temptation to stand up if you have been working sitting down and the view will not be the same.

2. Photographs taken in the high light conditions we were on Tuesday, can have too much contrast. The shade areas often looking very dark and very pale areas being ultra white. No worries in your painting to leave the white of the paper for the palest areas. This will give your work a really sunny appearance. If you copy the darkness of your reference in the shade areas you should ensure the differences in tone have sharper cut off points than on a dull day. In sun all shadows will be crisper..

If you need to lower the tone of a whole area this is usually best achieved by putting a wash over the whole of the darker area, leaving just a few tiny paler areas rather than doing it by dabbing away with small brush strokes. Sometimes by referencing your photo and on site watercolour, it can be better to to work another picture taking these tones into account with the first washes as this can be difficult on site in very sunny conditions.

Exactly how dark to make your shadows can also be greatly governed by your intention. The reality as in the first photo below was that the shadow area behind the canoes was so dark it was hardly even textured. You may choose the dark to offset the colour of the canoes for a dramatic effect, or you may choose the softer effect of seeing more of the texture and colour of the background as in the modified second photo below .

3. There is also a temptation to add washes to the water that soften the edges too much. Last Tuesday the weather made for very clear reflections and waves and that should be reflected in your paintings. Again this was made difficult as in places the water appeared very green. Where a paddle hits the water you can always give a little sparkle to the splash by scratching out with a sharp point. Wait till the rest of the painting is complete before attacking the paper in this way.

This week we’ll be at Hurley again and probably in very different light conditions. Notice any differences especially if you visit the same spot to paint. We’ll also talk about colour, especially the water and reflections.

Your paintings;

Such a treat today to be sitting outside drawing subjects we have become familiar with using photo reference. Before publishing I added more tone to these sketches from memory.

The heightened contrast reflects the very bright sunlight we worked in. I’m now going to discover the ‘photos taken at the same venues which I know will have too much contrast, so no good as photos but a very good reminder of the importance of tone in composition.

Your Sketches and Paintings from Sunny Maidenhead;

The challenge this week is to make a painting of boats and/or constructions on the river including weirs, locks, boathouses from sketches made from the riverbank. If the weather makes working by the river difficult why not look at any photos you may have of boats threading their way through the twists and turns of the Thames. It’s more difficult to draw a moving target from life so becoming familiar with the structure of boats and their effects on the water surface is easier from photographs.

However if you have the opportunity, it’s much more rewarding to work outside with a sketchbook. Start with the static objects and develop your confidence, and then try drawing the main shapes of boats and their wakes as they pass by,as swiftly as you can. With a little practice a real notion of movement can be achieved.

A few photographs of local parts of the Thames with moored and moving craft are below.

Think about the river and its banks, the relation of the boat to the water surface (the waterline, reflections and if moving the bow wave and wake, or if a motor boat how the water may be churned up by a propeller at the stern). The patterns of waves may extend far beyond the immediate vicinity of the boat.

If you attempt to draw or paint a lock, perhaps looking down from a bridge as you can at Maidenhead. Try drawing the large shapes of the lock first so that you get a feel for for its structure and aim to show its perspective. That will help you when you place a boat in it. Think of the lock as a big rather long box so the end away from you appears smaller. Then look at the water level in the lock and how the boat sits in it.

There are also occasions where boats are included as only a small element in a river landscape work so just as observing and drawing from human forms, observing and drawing boat forms will help you to be able to just ‘drop in a boat’ to enliven a composition.

Also included are boathouses and a couple of old rather abandoned looking dredgers and the turbulent water of the weir at Maidenhead.

With the weir draw its underlying structure lightly before indicating the frothy water tumbling over it. Hopefully we’ll be sketching outside but if not feel free to use any of these references or find a boat scene you would like to paint.

Some examples of paintings of boats and locks etc can be found on Jo’s Pinterest board using the link below:

https://www.pinterest.co.uk/jhall1282/from-the-riverbank/boats-locks-weirs-and-buildings/

Your Sketches and Paintings: