Analytical drawing

A very busy week and the volume of timed sketching exercises was very challenging and new.  A real eye opener.

Our topic remains the natural world and we had a variety of beach-combed objects to sketch - both our own and ones within the studio.

We started with drawing at an easel with a long stick dipped in black Indian ink.  Drawing at arms length.

It was quite startling but we got used to it after a bit and the results were interesting in that the variety of marks was basically uncontrolled and quite unplanned.  As we got used to the idea we realized that we could achieve different results by twisting the stick and angling it.  Quite surprisingly our efforts looked recognizable at the end of it.

We did a lot of work each day at a very fast timed pace.  Producing sketches within a short time-frame was very challenging.

We did close up pencil sketches of 3 objects and then changed the arrangement to a different position.  All the while observing and drawing - Holding the pencil at the end - which was very awkward and quite startling.

We did a magnification study of an object and draw what we saw through a magnifying glass - in both pencil and ink using a variety of marks.  Later we redrew a section of this study onto A5 paper and did a work in pastel both onto white and black surfaces using the same chalk pastels.

Drawing of rock pattern as seen under a microscope

 Magnified pencil sketch, 

enlarged onto A2 and drawn in charcoal.

Portion of A2 charcoal drawing, chosen for pastel work on A5

Pastel A5 work on both white and black cardboard

 We did some still life sketches using prepared collage surface, watercolour-wash surface - all timed exercises and using sticks and ink at arms length and also fineliner and pencil work - also holding it at the end and drawing at arms length.  For the collage we did an enlargement of the closeup we drew outside.  The surface was cramped and glued and we drew with Indian ink.

All very challenging and done within short time limits.

We were all very pushed to perform and challenged.

The next week we moved on to doing still-lifes of a large centerpiece of whale bones and doing sketches of these on A3 and A2 paper.

The first one was to draw without LOOKING and that was quite an experience and the results were quite embarrassing and we all felt a high level of anxiety.

Then we moved onto tonal work but had to draw without looking, then we did some drawing with only looking briefly.  Tonal studies are not something I have done before and I found these very challenging and wanted to run from the room, to be honest.

We drew with charcoal, chalk, conti on a variety of A2 & A3 as well as A4.  We looked at hatching and cross hatching and finally did a charcoal piece that was a little more rewarding and satisfying.

We covered the page with charcoal entirely and then smoothed it off.  Then we worked with an eraser and cloth to produce tonal studies of the whalebones.

This was my best piece of the day but by not means good in anyway.  The whole idea of drawing without carefully considering the object - paying careful detail to perspective, size and being unable to correct work -as well as the strict time frame - enforcing speed work ....this was all new to me as  a whole and something I was having difficulty with.


These tonal studies were very difficult and we were not allowed to use line but most of us found this impossible.


The final drawing using the charcoal background and eraser was the most satisfying and although it was still difficult - it looked better than the rest.

Being totally out of ones depth, drawing on a timescale and producing so many drawings each day was really challenging and most of the students looked tearful at some point - leaving the room for odd breaks.

We did start toughening up and the work we were producing was very different from our summer sketchbooks and we were all on a very, very steep learning curve.

The concept of drawing bones, skulls etc had not entered most of our minds and some were more disturbed than others at our subject matter but we got over it.

I can only say that my tonal work needs a lot of knowledge input and study of various self sourced additional notes and practice because as a mature student this is not something I have done and I felt like I was drowning.

At school about 25 years ago, before we chose our subjects - we did a very brief exercise in art basicall shading a sphere with a light shone on it to show a shadow.  It was so basic and distinct with the artificial lighting that nothing had prepared me for the whale bone studies and to top it off, I was having trouble focusing in the art studio as the lights were switched off.

Drawing with out looking was distressing and very challenging - although I can see the point of it i.e. training ones brain and hand movement to eventually improve the resultant drawing but it does seem that this would take time.  Doing this in a room full of students under timed exercises was quite horrifying and humiliating.

A week before I had been in the dentist where accidentally the anesthetic had been injected into my sensory never to my right eye - leaving my eye wide open for a long time.  THey had to tape down my eyelid as my eye was drying out and I had no control over it.   Even a week later it did not feel right and I had trouble focusing, my eye was leaking a lot and I had a twitch in the area around the eye.

Not a good week for me but then again I did learn and realise the point of the exercises.  I do want to practice this work more.

I went to visit the dr, dentist and optition to find out what could be done about my eye and how and if I could recover.

This will remain a difficulty I have to deal with.  The other problem I had is that I have neck and back problems so the standing at the easel doing speed sketching, holding the instrument at the end and drawing at arms length was all a bit too much for me and I found my hand and arm going numb so had to stop early on each piece during the day on Wednesday.

Definitely a big dent to ones self esteem.

For my assessment I found it very hard to chose the four pieces of work from this section.

The next thing we did was to mono printing (Following week) and this was fun and rewarding.

 It was nice to get away from the whale bones   - they were a challenge to say the least - not only their interlaced shapes but their very subtle tonal differences, the pile of them - a mass of lines and shapes in 3D.  They were all so similar in tone and again I can only say - what a challenge.

We worked with seaweed and experimented with a variety of papers, sizes, college, fabric, watercolour wash etc.  I was very happy doing these and it was fun and messy :)  Our subject was seaweed and we had a large variety of fresh seaweed to work with.

The final piece was  multimedia piece of several pieces of seaweed - set out to from a continuous image - using collage, watercolour, wax resist, pastel etc.   It was a lot of fun and I felt that my seaweed looked quite realistic although obviously we were working within a timeframe so I would have worked it longer and more effectively without that timelimit.

It is something I would do again :)

We also did a crab watercolour with wax resist - enlarging the image to fill the page.

We did a sketch of 3 beach-combing items within a time-frame.  First sketching and then using the faintest colour-wash on near white objects.

I enjoyed these although I felt I worked on my crab too long and in trying to make it darker lost the original effect that was very attractive.  The wax resist worked well though.

This is a very interesting course and very challenging.  We produce a lot of work each day within timed exercises on a wide variety of papers and drawing materials.

An excellent course and we have a lovely tutor who is very helpful and inspiring.

NEXT came the assessment !


We had to divide our work into 3 files and then chose 4 pieces from each file (Learning outcome).

This took some time for us all to do and I had to ask for help.  With my head injury and other issues - I was feeling unable to make decisions as I was not happy with the work I had produced under the spec we had had from the start.  I felt unable to chose work that I felt would show that I could produce anything of quality although I did have some favourites despite the conditions and specs we had worked under.

The sheer volume of work we had completed was quite impressive though and somewhere I managed to chose the 12 pieces for my assessment.

All the students passed their assessment and learning outcomes.