for this part of the course we were asked to draw a still life composition using just monochrome to imply texture and tone without excessive shading.
To start with I decided to draw a bag of apples.
I decided to draw a bag of apples on a small table. I used white ink on black paper. Even though this is a pretty good representation of what I was looking at, I am not really that enamoured with the outcome. It could be a cabbage or a pile of rags, there is nothing that determinable about it that makes it shout apples! So I decided to add in the bunch of bananas again to give it some context which then made the apples make sense.
I drew it again on black paper with a white pencil crayon. It was difficult to avoid blending and shading as this is something that I do a lot of when I am drawing.
I decided to try doing this same image, either as a whole or small sections of it using different colours and different materials.
I was finding it more challenging to do this exercise than I thought I would. I have enjoyed it though.
I did the same colours and the same composition but using white ink again and using a stiff paint brush.
I think that this worked better than the white pencil drawing of the same style and type.
I like the flow of the ink and the way that it sits in some lines much more thickly and with greater saturation and in others more thinly and more delicately. I have not drawn much with ink in the past but I really liked using it.
I decided to try doing something a bit more different later on with various pens and also a couple of drawings that were more abstract and then a picture with different subject matter.
The next couple were felt tip pens in different colours on differently coloured papers. I also had a go at pointillism.
I added a paper bag and moved the composition around slightly and drew on white paper with a fountain pen with purple ink:
This one I did as a preliminary sketch for the final piece for the playing with colours part of the module.
I decided to draw a few different monochrome pictures with different subject matter. This one is of three mackerel heads.
Although I really do like the effect of pointillism it is very time consuming and a bit tedious. I have to remind myself whilst I am doing it that the outcome will be very pleasing and striking so that I don’t get fed up and give up. This is a small drawing (A bit bigger than A5) stuck in my sketch book and it took around an hour or so to draw! All those tiny dots instead of shading takes absolutely ages!
Having said that is IS very striking and effective and a good way to use monochrome to achieve a totally different effect.
This one, above, was a change of subject again, black and white pencil on black paper of a sheep’s skull.
Above is a still life composition of sheep’s skull and various other shells, bottles and paint brushes which I drew using the black and white pencils on black paper. I really liked this one. I like the composition and think it looks very effective. I didn’t pursue this one any further. I wish that I had all the time in the world to pursue loads of the things in this module, there is so much scope for developing nearly everything that I have done!
This one on the right is an abstract line drawing of a capsicum pepper.
I decided to use lots of colours for this one just as an experiment. It was just a bit of fun, but it was so effective and fun that I decided to stick it in my sketch book after all! I also did a row of a few colourful garlic bulbs in a similar style.
I used loads of different ink pens, biros, felt tips, gel pens and fine liners and a fountain pen for the pepper and a mixture of coloured felt tip pens for the garlic.
Although I deviated from the initial brief for these ones, I think that they are really effective and they were great fun to draw too!
Again this was a most enjoyable part of the course and something that I really could take further. It will be really difficult to decide which parts to develop when I am finally ready to prepare to get things wrapped up and ready for assessment. Although it has taken me a long time to get things sorted out, this has been a hugely important and exciting journey for me, where I have come up against a lot of my own demons, barriers and walls but also been enormously inspired and excited by what I have done so far!
"Pencil-Case" 