A Blog about Blogs

The title of this blog resonates detest through my veins. I don't enjoy blogging and feel there is numerous other things I could be doing with my time. One of the reasons I am an artist is to avoid sitting in front of a computer screen. Regardless I understand how useful of a tool blogging actually is. In a college setting it makes for a very useful way of determining a semester's progress as well as create a good medium for taking notes in and furthering said notes through other students blogs. Blogging has helped me in talking about my work, my artist's voice, and vocalizing the artistic process as well as the pictorial plane. I believe I did a fairly decent job in sustaining a blog, I have some interesting posts that I believe would be valuable to other students as I am beginning to get some public work done and have further public projects in the mix. I would have liked to write a further in depth analysis of many of my posts but my own impatience and view of the blogging as a distraction got the better of me. Although I do understand the value of having an online presence as this is a connection with the world and has stemmed many contemporary artists careers, however the network of artists here feels untapped. I've received only a few required comments although this is to be expected as I have only given a few. I have surfed through a few various blogs but I feel I am a minority to the online populous doing so as there are little comments left anywhere. I rarely have commented where I probably should have, artists can benefit from feedback, good or bad. The blogging process is undoubtedly one that is good to be familiar with.

Man

The clay manikin has been a fun project that has taught me the interior structure of the human body. Learning how light hits the body inside out has been tremendously beneficial on understanding how to depict the human form. Yoga has taught me to feel my form, building a clay man is another step in understanding the figure as well as my own body. I feel drawing the clay figure is the next step in processing this information
This is an anterior shot of the torso. I feel my crafting is a little rough because I had no carving tools in building my muscles however I feel I retained more information by crafting and constructing the muscles using my hands. I feel the strongest aspect of this view is the imprint of my wrist band leading down the abdominal section reading "Donate Life".


This Posterior View of the manikin shows the Spinal erectors, longisimus and thoracis muscles. Yoga has taught me the sheer importance of the spine as it effects every part of your body. This muscle mass twists around the neck, down the spine and reaches into the pelvis. These muscles are designed to support against gravity as well as move the entire body. My muscles seem to have gotten a little bulky on the sides but overall I feel I have a much better sense of what exactly I'm stretching in a twisting triangle.


This Anterior view of the leg shows tensor . Looking onto the muscles now I feel I should have made the quads and vastus muscles larger. Although, I do have really skinny legs and feel the manikin is appropiate in reflecting myself. This picture also sow the tensor fasciae which I have coloured in white. I feel that making the muscles multiple colours, using bodyworlds as a reference, has created a more visually aesthetic piece as well as helped me in understanding the musculature system.


The posterior view of the leg depicts the gluteus maximus down to the soleus and achilles tendon. I see the side extensors could be shaved down a bit however the gastronemues does fit perfectly into the bicep femoris, creating a spatial triangular gap. The muscles could fit together better if I had used tools however I feel I captured the gesture of the legs as they twist around the leg. Through building the manikin I feel I have furthered my understanding in how the muscles behave. This is extremely valuable depicting the form in giving emphasis on action as well as visual stimuli.

A timely depiction

Presented here are several long studies. The female figure was really enjoyable to draw however it was executed very ineffectively. The torso is stretched and to have avoided this I should have made a more pliable figural study, including interior landmarks rather than attempt to catch light as it falls on the figure. This was the first female drawing in class and I could not resist denying the beauty of those reflections.

The male figure study with detailed abdominal section and shoulder girdle turned out fairly well. The line of the leg is rather descriptive suggesting form in space and fading into interior depiction of the musculature system. The anatomy lessons we've been going through have been very helpful in defining exterior space. The gesture lines of the piece show through and I like that expressive touch.

The female contour drawing turned out really good for me. The proportion worked rather well seeing as I had a fairly foreshortened view of the model sitting in the lotus position on the floor. The drawing looks like an organic landscape to me, pulling my eyes through space and over physical form. My eyes are drawn all the way back to connect with the models eye, visible just through the poorly shaded armpit. I also consider the geographic contour lines to be successful in depicting space. This form of depiction is somewhat new to me and I found it to be remarkably descriptive in describing space and form through line quality.

guessture

Pictured above are three early gesture drawings. These are inadequate in describing form as they give no real description of interior structure or any reference to the three dimensions of a figure. They are merely two dimensional outlines of the model. Below the text are gesture figure studies with a little more developed flavour. The red sketch, being only a thirty second study is actually quite descriptive, far more so than an outline and actually excluding the outline entirely. The figure has recognizable landmarks for interior and exterior imagery. The simple line stroke almost even carries an attitude with it. The placement could have been better as the figure is just stepping over the line. The landmarks are presented in the one minute sketch, however the hips are a little wide and the ribcage appears a little large thus losing some information. The linework in the legs are very descriptive, implying more form. The five minute study includes interior landmarks as well as begining to dapple in multi-coloured line work. I was attempting to emphasize the stretch through detailing the muscles being stretched in red. I really enjoy the placement of the figure as the weight of the drawing is brought heavily on the character, his hand reaching out of the borders, almost pulling himself out of the picture.

Tagger Party

Thursday night was rolling around and I actually found a party that interested me. The disc golf house was throwing a tagger party which entitles tagging a person and tagging a wall. The media was marker, black paint and white t-shirts. Jake Olson and I showed up, said hello to a few peeps and jumped right into the walls. The party was a blast canvas was everywhere, every wall and even walking around you on every persons back. After a few warm up sketches we started working together on a mural. We actually had no idea how it turned out until several days later when photos started popping up on facebook.