Final Reflection

In life drawing I feel that I have learned a lot and refreshed some skills that I have not worked with in a while. Drawing overall, has been somewhat of a challenge for me in the past, but I rather enjoy sketching. I feel that I sometimes lose interest in strictly drawing. However, life drawing has captured my interest in drawing again and I think it has a lot to do with the process in which we develop a structure in life drawing. An understanding must come before an accurately drawn representation of form. At the start of this semester I set out to improve my general drawing abilities, become more sensitive with line, and understand contour better. Through this semester I feel that I've successfully accomplished each one of these goals. I am incorporating the drawing techniques that I've learned in life drawing and utilizing them within ID work. This is exciting when fine art can be met with design, even if it is only in the process.

I am mostly proud of the work that I've done in life drawing. Like with any studio course, there were some struggles, but I felt that each time we drew I learned something. I do think that any art or design student can benefit from learning how to draw structurally. If nothing else, you do gain a far better understanding of the human form. I've learned some things in the class and I've definitely made improvements in my own style and ability. Even since mid-term, I've improved with my line placement and weight. These improvements are beginning to show in my sketching ideation for my Industrial Design degree as well, which is, again, very exciting!

Here is a link to my final flickr photostream.

Skulls man

Drawing skulls is kind of an epic experience. I do think that these things are pretty challenging to draw. This is the first skull drawing I did. It is the side profile and I think fairly successful. Either way, I think skulls are a pretty good thing to draw in order to understand the facial structures of drawings. I think my line sensitivity is improving and I am more aware of my line placement. So overall, a good week in life drawing.

Progress

So this is my second shell ink wash and I feel that it was a definite improvement. The paper makes quite a difference and I learned a thing or two from the second shell drawing that I inked. So, overall, a definite improvement in my mind. I was able to achieve a better level of contrast throughout the drawing and didn't completely wash out the contours that I had drawn in charcoal. In fact, I felt that the contour drawing itself was the best shell drawing so far. So with this drawing I am pretty excited. I feel a lot better about ink wash after messing around with it a bit too.

Shell Wash

So this was an interesting assignment. This is my second shell drawing, with the second larger shell. It was nice to switch because I was having a difficult time seeing the detail in my initial shell. Either way, I felt this was an improvement from my first attempt. During class we began using ink washes and I struggled somewhat. I eventually began to control the ink and water somewhat, but not completely successfully. I do enjoy the blending of the charcoal and the wash, but it would not really be my first choice for rendering a shell. I do think the wash makes sense in that it is relative to the shell environment. We will be doing more shell inkings so hopefully I will improve with the watery inks.

Midterm Reflection

So at the midterm, I feel that I've made some definite improvements. For one, I am experiencing drawing again. It has been over a year since drawing two and since then I've been mostly doing design sketching as a part of Industrial Design. I also feel that I am much more sensitive in my line placement and weight. This was initially one of the goals I had in mind upon beginning Life Drawing. So I am happy with that. I am beginning to understand form and contour much better through drawing the models during class. I didn't really understand what a valuable experience it may be. I am incorporating the things I've been learning in Life Drawing in my Industrial Design work. I've a much better understanding of how to properly utilize contour lines in my sketches, even on organic surfaces. I've always struggled with this, ever since Presentation Techniques.

I am finding that drawing the models is the most beneficial learning experience from the class so far. I also am beginning to just overall enjoy drawing, which has been a challenge in semesters past. Using ink is a crazy experience in this class, but I do find it enjoyable when going well. I've learned a lot so far this semester. I've improved my technique quite a bit and found a freedom or looseness in drawing which is helping overall in drawing and sketching. I plan to keep working on the lines that I put down on the page and the understanding of reading surfaces and structures.

Here is a link to my flickr page

Here are some images of a project I recently completed in ID Art & Science of Production.

My it's been some time since I've visited my Life Drawing blog.

So now that spring is really beginning to set in, I am beginning to notice my natural surroundings much more. I feel that the looming sense of winter has faded and I am paying much more attention to all the life coming back to the surface.

I've been looking at the ant hills accumulating outside of my apartment lately. Ants, I feel, are in a constant state of highly organized rebuilding. They are constantly adapting to the changes around them. In a way, we too are constantly adapting to our surroundings. In the context of Life Drawing, I feel that I've taken much from the things going on around me. In the design world, we become very comfortable with the visual language surrounding us and begin to see more clearly what it is we're dealing with. Like ants, we are rebuilding or at least building upon a framework that will help us succeed in accomplishing our goals. So, I suppose let's all keep up the good work!

OMG Sketches!

These are a couple of fairly quick sketches I did earlier this semester for an ID project. I like to show a variety of work relative to drawing and Life Drawing as I find our style of drawing in class much different from my ID work. I have been thinking all of this semester that it has been strange bouncing back and forth between design sketching and gesture/ contour drawing. This is not to say that I am enjoying either style of drawing any less than the other. In fact, I feel it really beneficial to be working on line and essential drawing skills again! I am beginning to understand that my enjoyment of drawing brought me into the Industrial Design program here at Stout, but then within ID I somewhat lost interest in basic drawing... HOWEVER, I am very happy to be in Life Drawing because I am beginning to once again ENJOY drawing! I hate to say it but, ID kind of killed my enthusiasm for drawing for a little bit... OH NO! Either way, I'm back on track, love drawing, and love ID!

Drawing Shells and Such

Life drawing has been going pretty well I would say. We've been working on drawing shells, which are a pretty decent subject for drawing. It is interesting attempting to understand the structure of the shell and then draw it accordingly. It does prove to be a fairly effective way of drawing. I suppose with any sort of drawing, structural knowledge will always prove valuable. It is neat to see the different drawings the class is producing. Each student seems to have their own style and I think that is a really cool thing to see in a class. In my mind, style in any kind of drawing is key. I also feel that I am beginning to develop a style within the drawings I've been doing and I enjoy developing it. That's it for now!

This is one a long gesture drawing from class. It was one of the first long poses we worked on and I feel it turned out fairly well. I found it somewhat difficult to focus so much on the direction of line, but it was interesting to draw via visual mapping. Either way, I do feel that there are perhaps too many lines throughout the horizontal axis. The drawing looks somewhat like a mummy even, but oh well, lesson learned. I hope to progress as we draw more.

Renders with a hint of Life Drawing

So I am taking another advanced drawing course along with Life Drawing this semester. It has been kind of tricky to balance Advanced Presentation Techniques alongside Life Drawing as both are utilizing an entirely different style of drawing/ sketching. I do, however, feel it is really interesting to compare the work being done in both classes. So you've seen some of my Life Drawing work and some of my Industrial Design work here, but for this post I would like to show you a piece from Adv. Pres. Tech! I am pretty happy with the rendering of this Wall-E inspired robot. The idea here is that Wall-E and Eve made a robotic baby somehow! There is much more control in digital rendering than hand drawn line although in the digital sense, your images may lose some of their humanistic expressive qualities. Either way, I am enjoying being enrolled in BOTH advanced drawing classes and am finding that they balance one another quite nicely.

Walker Art Center Trip

This is the best image I could find online from artnews.org. Quasi MB- In the Middle of its Story was formatted differently in the Walker.


Haegue Yang: Integrity of the Insider

I really enjoyed this space in the Walker. The artist has a very creative way of using a wide variety of materials in her investigations. I felt that the Yearning Melancholy Red installation was intensely affective. I, however, chose to write about a more subtle, yet equally intriguing piece spanning the corner of a wall titled, Quasi MB- In the Middle of its Story (2006/2007). This installation of eighteen framed black and white printed pieces of paper translating the washed out ink on what seemed to be scraps of paper. The same handwriting appears on each scrap of paper, although it is not the artist's handwriting. The first frame in the series is numbered 11 and houses a piece of paper with Korean characters neatly written in ink. This is the only frame with Korean text. The series continues with a frame numbered 12 below 11. The order continues in this way as a vertical series of rows; 14,14,14;15,16,17 until it reaches the corner of the wall. On the adjacent face of the wall the series continues 19,20,20. At the bottom of this series, the pattern changes and becomes horizontal. The next frames spanning across the wall; 21,22,24,23,27. Below 23 is 25. Below 27 is 26. Written, this pattern is very confusing. Visually, this formatting seems very composed. Here are some excerpts from the frames.

Frame 14:
The writing is not to be read
It is, rather to be seen,
In other words,
To be witnessed as writing
Still, I have to write
In order to hide writing
Is is crucial to write
Yet my writing can't be read
The reason why writing disappears is
Not because the rain washes away my letters
But because it is being filmed.

Frame 20:
A sense of shame
A sense of shame
A sense of shame
A sense of shame
A sense of shame
A sense of shame
A sense of shame
A sense of shame
A sense of shame
A sense of shame
A sense of shame
A sense of shame
A sense of shame
A sense of shame

I read each frame as I proceeded from 11 to 27 (left to right within a 90 degree corner; 18 frames). It was interesting to think about where these scraps of paper had been found, all having been signed "MB". I began creating scenarios in my mind and visualizing the artist finding these letters or following someone who recorded and then discarded all their thoughts. Around the corner of the gallery space was another installation. This was a vintage projector playing a 16mm film. This silent video installation depicted a man sitting outside with a pen and an ink reservoir writing as best he could on a sheet of paper, all the while it is raining on him. The rain seems artificial and localized over this one writing individual. He, however, does not seem to mind the rain and continues attempting to write. This continues for three minutes and replays. After watching the piece I found out that it was Marcel Broodthaers' La Pluie (Project pour un texte) 1969. This piece being by a different artist didn't seem to fit into the gallery, but also seemed to explain Yang's Quasi MB piece. The dichotomies continued when I entered the Yearning Melancholy Red installation and passed between a fan and an industrial heat lamp juxtaposed on either side of me.

I'm not entirely certain that I've made the connection between the Quasi MB piece and the 16mm film. I definitely find it interesting. The rest of the gallery was exclusively Haegue Yang's work so I felt that the inclusion of another artist's work must have been a very intentional decision. I understand that the "writer" of the pieces for Yang's Quasi MB-In the Middle of its Story, was Marcel Broodthaers. I know that this could not have happened as Marcel Broodthaers 1) made his film La Pluie, in 1969 and 2) he passed away in the mid 1970's. So perhaps Quasi MB-In the Middle of its Story is Yang's homage to Marcel Broodthaers. It seems to depict the words that were written in MB's 16mm film. So I guess it kind of creates a relationship in the sense that there is a very curious connection.

This gallery was definitely the highlight of my trip to the Walker, although I really enjoyed the Event Horizon gallery too. Overall, the Walker is always a great trip and I was happy to have gone.

Last week in life drawing we began working on visualizing the rib cage which is much like an egg shape in space. It is interesting how we are learning about the the main skeletal structures along with the muscles that work with them. I added a couple of images of my manikan. I worked on the back muscles a bit more to make them a bit more accurate (I think) before I started on the abs. I feel that working on the muscles really does help to understand how to draw figures. I also begin thinking a lot about how this all works together. Cool stuff.

On another note, I'm excited for the museum trip on Wednesday!

My Life Drawing shell is called a Conch Shell. Gastropod mollusks use these shells as their homes! The shells are a built-up exoskeleton of calcium carbonate. The folded lip of the shell is where the mollusk is able to peak its foot out and jump itself forward. Conches grow this flared lip on their shells only upon reaching sexual maturity. The fold of the shell is usually developed after about three years of “growing”. Some species of mollusks can live up to forty years and their shells can grow to lengths of twelve inches.

From what I’ve gathered, my shell is specifically a Queen Conch shell. The Queen Conch, Strombus gigas, first appeared over sixty-five million years ago. The shell itself was used for many things such as pots, chisels, and scrapers! Conch shells have also been known to be used as weapons over a fighter’s hand. These weapons, however, would only be right-handed due to the growing direction of all Conch shells. Today, Conch shells are used for jewelry, art and decoration, occasionally as building materials, and are sold as souvenirs. Conches consume a diet of mostly plant life including sea grass which they feed upon at night when predators are less active. Most of the day a Conch spends its time buried in the sandy ocean floor. This careful behavior seems to aid the Conch shells’ growth and longevity.

This is an image of a drawing we did after speaking about the spinal column. I believe this is a 30 minute continuous contour.

I felt that I learned a lot this week during class and through the homework assignments. I am not only learning about form and drawing the complex three dimensional surfaces of the body, but I am also learning how to control my lines more. The drawings are progressing each time we begin a new class. I am excited to see what I've been learning in Life Drawing being translated into my Industrial Design work. I am doing a lot of sketching for my ID classes and I am beginning to notice that my lines are much more controlled and a bit more confident. I am also beginning to use different muscles for drawing and sketching. I am starting to notice how I am most comfortable drawing and sketching. I tried standing doing sketches and it was a much different experience although yielded good results. I look forward to the next week of drawing and am beginning to enjoy all the drawing I'm doing this semester.

Drawing Without Sight

So the blind contour drawing exercise was pretty different for me. As an Industrial Design student we are taught to be very creatively controlled in our drawings. This exercise was quite different from design sketching. I did, however, begin to more carefully feel what I was drawing. I began drawing the feet which were, in my viewing plane, farthest to the left. It was fairly intuitive to start there as I suppose I'm used to reading left to right. I tried to maintain a mental map of where I was drawing relative to what I had already drawn... this proved difficult. I do feel that the drawing was somewhat accurate in the end and I did learn how to control line a little more through the exercise. I also found that I began using cross contours to establish form. This seemed to help define the drawing in my mind (mental map of the image). Pretty interesting.

Hello! My name is Ben Cesar. I am a junior level Industrial Designer here at Stout. I also have three years experience in the Packaging Engineering program although ID is my primary focus. I am taking life drawing because 1) I would like to improve my fine arts skills in drawing 2) I would like to gain a better understanding of contour 3) it is highly recommended that industrial designers involve themselves in much drawing. I would also like to gain more control over line itself which is an important tool in all art and design.

Here are some pics of work I've been doing as of late!