Still Life

During the fashion cycle we also delved
into the medium of still life and were
introduced to some of the techniques
used in this area.

This was the first time I had tried still
life with a nude model. It was quite
odd I can't lie however as the day
continued it became more of a
pure art study rather than feeling
awkward.

The lecturer that orchestrated the exercise made sure
that we explored multiple mediums on paper. For
example; pastel, charcoal, fine liner and pencil.
Working primarily on A2 paper sizes the style of
art was very fluid and spontaneous. Our lecturer
motivated us to work innovatively experimenting with
ways to mark the paper. For example using your
weaker drawing hand, not moving your hand
away from the paper, closing your eyes
and fixing charcoal to the end of bamboo
to force your hand a particular distance
away from the paper. All exercises were
interesting as well as difficult in there
own ways for instance working with
your eyes closed forces you to work
primarily on instinct rather than visibility.
These exercises therefore made you
rely on particular aspects of your body
you wouldn't use normally or depend on as
much.

A piece that combines the mediums I explored during
the activity with the subject of the work in multiple
poses. The profiles used in this particular example
are; pastel, fine liner, charcoal and pencil.

I chose each medium specifically for the pose created
by the model to capture the posture and movement of
his actions. Additionally, the speed of the sketches
was a matter of minutes for each exercise. This was
so that multiple pieces of experimentation could be
achieved as well as not becoming tied down by one
individual piece. Therefore, the outcomes were fast
observations that hopefully visualise the model in
his natural form.
  

This is the exercise that constricted me
to use a bamboo stick with a piece of
charcoal taped on the end with my
weaker drawing hand. The activity was
a challenge as perception was changed
both in distance as well as angle.
This made shading and detail on the
piece particularly difficult not even
mentioning the brittleness of the
charcoal.

Nevertheless, the experience of this
activity was helpful to understand
mark making of still life. Similar to
Giorgio Morandi cross hatching
technique used to define structure
and shadow in still life.

Overall the introduction to still life for me
was very rewarding. The skills I tried such
as cross hatching with charcoal are
important mark marking techniques that
I will develop further in future briefs. Other
mark making techniques for example
with bamboo were fun to test but will
probably be left at that. However,
even these were also important lessons
into perception and mark making
even though it's odd medium.