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Friday in the atelier: “Korean” By Calladus

Posted on October 27, 2006September 23, 2016 by calladus

Since today is my birthday, and more importantly since I’ve been very busy both with work and in my personal life this week, I thought I’d take a break and show off, just a little.

This sketch is one of mine, from 2001. I really don’t have anymore of a name than “Korean Model” for it.

First disclaimer, I don’t have any formal training that is worth a darn in teaching the basics of figure sketching. I’ve got books, and patience, and a fair eye. My mistakes may not be noticeable to an amateur, but I assure you they are there. (Look at that ear, for example! My word, what was the artist THINKING?)

I had a lot of art classes while growing up. Standard high school stuff and one freshman art class with a mediocre teacher. (He was actually a decent teacher, but only a fair artist.)

The model for this picture is a magazine image. I liked her eyes, and wanted to capture her warmth. The original image was in color, but otherwise was mostly as you see.

The problem with the ear – Artists must train themselves to draw what they see, and not what they think. Ask any non-artist to draw an ear, and they draw a coffee cup handle. Ask someone to draw a nose in profile and they’ll draw an upside down question mark.

You fight your preconceptions and draw what you see. I wasn’t quite successful. If I had turned the magazine upside down and drawn from that, the ear would have been more lifelike, but the rest of the image would have suffered.

Shading was accomplished with a soft lead and a kneading eraser. I used hairspray to bind the lead and then shaded again over that in layers to create the dark shading that I needed. I love the knead-able erasers! I used a tortillon and my finger for blending.

I like this drawing. I wish I had more time to draw, but honestly it doesn’t fascinate me as much as working in wood or as much as learning something new. Perhaps I will concentrate on my own artistic abilities later in my life, I dunno.

In any case, I hope you enjoyed it.

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