How many times have I heard "I can't draw". Nonsense. Everyone can draw. If you look at the history of all art you will find many examples of drawing and all of them are valid. There is no such thing as a mistake in Art.
What people really mean is "I wish I could draw like Michaelangelo" or whoever. Welcome to the club! I draw in my own style. It's taken me many years to shake off that desire to 'draw well', but since I have (well mostly have), the results have become more pleasing. Not just because I only care if I like it, but also because I'm no longer putting pressure on myself and that makes me more relaxed. Being relaxed in turn frees me up to do better and better work. Sometimes it frustrates me that I haven't mastered a distinct enough style but that's down to my lack of patience, nothing more.
One of the best ways to develop your drawing (and indeed any form of art) is to experiment and to get to know your medium. So if it's a pencil, pen, piece of charcoal or anything to make a mark with, first spend time exploring what you can do with it. By pressing hard you can make dark intense marks, by applying hardly any pressure you can make delicate, light and soft marks. By using a the point of a pencil you will get a different set of marks to those you'll get by using the edge of a pencil or piece of charcoal.
5 DRAWING EXERCISES
1. Light and Shade
Set up a still life from man made objects which catch the light. Ideally shine a light on only one side of the object. On a piece of black paper draw only the places where the light hits the objects with a white pencil, pastel or piece of chalk. If desired, then add a mid-tone (something that is between the darkest parts and the lightest. Remember you are only looking for the tone in this exercise, not trying to draw the shape of the objects.
The next stage is to make a frame that you hold up for something you draw from life, such as a bowl of fruit but you must be careful that neither you nor it move when you look through it, it must always be in exactly the same place each time. As you progress you should be able to see those shapes (that's all it's about really) without any gird or frame to help you.
Again only concentrate of the form, ignore texture, light and shade for this exercise. All these exercises are training you to look at things a different way as well as helping to build a library of drawing knowledge.
5. Doddle Art
Tear or cut out a small piece of a picture from a magazine (a black and white photo is best). The piece you pick should have as many different textures and shades as you can find, and shouldn't be recognisable as anything in particular. Stick the image on a piece of paper and now try to extend and match the textures you find all round the edge. The aim is to make enough marks to camouflage what the original picture was and turn it into something else.
The development of this is to follow this up with a doodle of shapes and textures to help you develop your command of your drawing implement further. It doesn't have to be a scene it can be just patterns of whatever comes into your mind.
FINAL TIP
Save all your efforts and put them away. If you just throw things away you can never look back on the progress you make, so keep everything! There really is no 'one way' to draw so however you choose to learn, enjoy it. I often envy beginners as the rate at which they learn is never repeated maybe that's why I take long breaks between serious drawing studies so I can learn all over again!
What people really mean is "I wish I could draw like Michaelangelo" or whoever. Welcome to the club! I draw in my own style. It's taken me many years to shake off that desire to 'draw well', but since I have (well mostly have), the results have become more pleasing. Not just because I only care if I like it, but also because I'm no longer putting pressure on myself and that makes me more relaxed. Being relaxed in turn frees me up to do better and better work. Sometimes it frustrates me that I haven't mastered a distinct enough style but that's down to my lack of patience, nothing more.
One of the best ways to develop your drawing (and indeed any form of art) is to experiment and to get to know your medium. So if it's a pencil, pen, piece of charcoal or anything to make a mark with, first spend time exploring what you can do with it. By pressing hard you can make dark intense marks, by applying hardly any pressure you can make delicate, light and soft marks. By using a the point of a pencil you will get a different set of marks to those you'll get by using the edge of a pencil or piece of charcoal.
Drawing Accurately
For those of you who really want to put yourselves through hell by trying to draw accurately there are plenty of books and classes to help but here's the best tip I was taught. Draw what you see, not what you know is there.
It means looking long and hard at how things relate to each other, breaking away from knowing that a face is round with a sticking out nose and seeing the individual shapes within the nose, the lips, the cheeks, chin and eyes. It means seeing the distance between the tip of the nose and the tip of the chin and recognizing whether or not it's the same distance as the nose is to the eyebrow line. Depending on what angle you are looking at the face it will vary.
To draw accurately requires concentration, looking at shapes, angles, light, shade, texture, form, measuring like mad and learning how to translate all that into marks on the page. My personal opinion is creativity is about conveying an impression and doing so in a personal and unique way and most of all in an expressive way. Techniques merely provide you with some skills to do that, but great things are possible with even very few skills.
It means looking long and hard at how things relate to each other, breaking away from knowing that a face is round with a sticking out nose and seeing the individual shapes within the nose, the lips, the cheeks, chin and eyes. It means seeing the distance between the tip of the nose and the tip of the chin and recognizing whether or not it's the same distance as the nose is to the eyebrow line. Depending on what angle you are looking at the face it will vary.
To draw accurately requires concentration, looking at shapes, angles, light, shade, texture, form, measuring like mad and learning how to translate all that into marks on the page. My personal opinion is creativity is about conveying an impression and doing so in a personal and unique way and most of all in an expressive way. Techniques merely provide you with some skills to do that, but great things are possible with even very few skills.
5 DRAWING EXERCISES
1. Light and Shade
Set up a still life from man made objects which catch the light. Ideally shine a light on only one side of the object. On a piece of black paper draw only the places where the light hits the objects with a white pencil, pastel or piece of chalk. If desired, then add a mid-tone (something that is between the darkest parts and the lightest. Remember you are only looking for the tone in this exercise, not trying to draw the shape of the objects.
2. Eye Training
You can train your eye to look for shapes by copying from a photo. Drawing a grid over the top of the photo and then draw an identical grid onto your page. Then copy what you see in each square of the photo.
3. Contours
To indicate the shape of an object we can use contour lines which follow a direction to indicate how round it is or whether or not it is coming towards us or away from us. Henry Moore's drawings often used this technique as it helped him to envisage how the forms would work to enable him to make his sculptural forms.
4. Textured/pattern forms
This time the aim is to only use texture to indicate different tones (strength or light or dark). Set up a still life and the rule is the lighter the area the looser the texture should be. This exercise is best done with a pen of some kind where it's harder to vary the tone of the marks you make.5. Doddle Art
Tear or cut out a small piece of a picture from a magazine (a black and white photo is best). The piece you pick should have as many different textures and shades as you can find, and shouldn't be recognisable as anything in particular. Stick the image on a piece of paper and now try to extend and match the textures you find all round the edge. The aim is to make enough marks to camouflage what the original picture was and turn it into something else.
The development of this is to follow this up with a doodle of shapes and textures to help you develop your command of your drawing implement further. It doesn't have to be a scene it can be just patterns of whatever comes into your mind.
Save all your efforts and put them away. If you just throw things away you can never look back on the progress you make, so keep everything! There really is no 'one way' to draw so however you choose to learn, enjoy it. I often envy beginners as the rate at which they learn is never repeated maybe that's why I take long breaks between serious drawing studies so I can learn all over again!
No comments:
Post a Comment