Last week, I was talking about creativity with one of my Imaginary Digital Friends, and ruefully remarked "I don't draw anymore."
Of course, we decided we should both do some kind of drawing over the weekend. Seemed like a good idea at the time. Then we both promptly blew the assignment off.
Eventually, Jennifer beat me to the 'draw'. But last night, I forgot to bring my digital files home to work on, and since I had nothing better to do, it was time. I was challenged to draw "monkeys baking souffles" but seriously, I canNOT draw a monkey. However ....
This was our old dog, who passed away a couple of years ago. I had this photo floating around, which captures Mieshka nearly perfectly, and I tend not to draw living things very often. I also tend not to work from photos, so it was worth it to try. It's charcoal and pencil, very smudgey. I like the smudgey media, I had to keep washing the char off my hands.
Then, because I WAS having some fun and my finGAHS were all smudged up already, tried another one....
I was trying to catch the simple, unfettered doggy joy of leaping into a lake.
Unlike Jen, I did not plan these for scanning, and had to work with photos since they are too large for my scanner; so they may have lost a little depth. [EDIT] I concede that I have a tendency to over-size my work. For my Master's Thesis design project, I did smudgey pencil renderings of the project including plans and sections, the combined site plan/floor plan was over 8 feet long. I wore out 4 or 5 HB pencils.
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They're WONDERFUL!!! I love how your old pooch's snout literally pops off the page. Those are puffers I would kiss.
ReplyDeleteAnd... I do indeed recognize the joyful leaping dog. :)
This was fun, ZRM!
And, I love the title of the post. Trap the Spark indeed. One of my mottoes is Honor the Spark so the title hits home.
ReplyDeleteThanks again ZRM for playing.
I was listening to Marillion, and Trap The Spark is one of their songs.
ReplyDeleteNice smudgies. I always have a hard time with charcoal. It never does what I want it to do. I like how the second one catches kinetic dog and the dark patches on the underbelly and the matching shadow give the feeing of immanent collision.
ReplyDeleteCaptcha seems to think there is a subthex.
Really wonderful, ZRM! I love your smudginess! You guys are too cool. And should be drawing all the time!
ReplyDeleteEspecially you, Zombie Brains, you *almost* as good as.....me! lol
I was trying to catch the simple, unfettered doggy joy of leaping into a lake.
ReplyDeleteNicely done! By the way, some people like it, too.
~
You are very talented!!
ReplyDeleteI love both of these!
And a blog post to boot!!
Yipee!
These are wonderful! Despite being based on photos, they have such immediacy. You didn't fiddle over details but went right for the gist. Thank you! Do more! (Jen, you, too!)
ReplyDeleteIt never does what I want it to do.
ReplyDeleteWell, there's your problem [/mythbuster] You have to do what the charcoal wants.
I had a great art teacher in college, who did immense charcoal cliffscapes. They were part landscape, part abstract. and he invariable included a small party of nuns, hang-gliding or mountain climbing....
He taught a drawing class that used charcoal, and the lasting thing I learned is that the smudgey mess of charcoal (and pastels, to a lesser degree) is it's nature, and you need to work within that.
They never had a fine enough point for my liking, even though I often use the side of my pencil, I still want the fine point to be accessible.
ReplyDeleteyou need to work within that.
That could be said for all mediums. It's a dance. Some are better partners than others. Some are leaders, some are followers.
This is starting to sound like a Kenny Rodgers song...
You've got to know how to hold them... know when to smudge them, know when to walk away, know when it's not done...
Very cool, and I like the smudging. Gives these an impressionistic feel.
ReplyDeleteI was inspired by you and Jennifer to try drawing myself, but after seeing both of your results, my stick figure with a huge penis just looks really sad.
No stick penis for Brando!! :)
ReplyDeleteThose are good. Eyes need to bulge and throb though.
ReplyDeletewooooooooah! that doggie jumping one is teh awesome!
ReplyDeleteEyes need to bulge and throb though.
ReplyDeleteyou mutilate that picture of my sweet lil goggie, Substance, and I will eat your brains.
with relish.
ReplyDeleteThat could be said for all mediums. It's a dance. Some are better partners than others. Some are leaders, some are followers.
O your right. I didn't mean to imply that charcoal is alone in that.
Maybe it's more that charcoal can't be thought of as a really soft pencil, and I suspect that's maybe where people start with it. It's certainly how I started, and it wasn't until I started to live with the smudges and lack of a point, to revel in that, that charcoal started to resonate for me....
Maybe I will start doing nothing but charcoal renderings for my clients. Your choice is fish*.
*MenD style footnotery. That's a slang that Henry Rollins coined in one of his spoken word piece. Also in this piece: "Your Shit Is All Apart" and "Be Drinkable" I fully intend to use these much more, in an attempt to make myself even more incomprehensible.
I was inspired by you and Jennifer to try drawing myself,
ReplyDeleteCut it out. You might be as good at it as you are with teh Funnay, and I would have to destroy you.
With relish.
Save some skill sets for us dull-normals, wouldja? Sheesh.
these are great!! they made me very happy.
ReplyDeleteI have always doodled a lot (especially in class and meetings), and believe me, I am in no danger of ever being adequate with drawing.
ReplyDeleteI have always doodled a lot (especially in class
ReplyDeleteMy high school notebooks could have been subtitled Starships and Cartoons, with Occasional Words
The point of charcoal is there is not point...
ReplyDelete