I sat one evening watch a bit of a draw-along video from the RA – helpfully entitled Life Drawing:Live! – which featured a highly agile male model. I had intended just to watch and learn for a while, but he swung straight in to such perfect poses for this exercise that I just had to grab my nearest sketchbook (A4) and pencil (2B) – yes, wherever you go in my house now, there are sketchbooks and drawing implements left lying about, which I am arguing is the mark of the true artist – and have a go. These were 2 minute poses moving on to 3 minute poses, and I really focused on getting the lines moving plus trying to maintain proportion by quickly indicating joints.
The drawing I am most pleased with is the second – I think I’ve got some good sweeping lines there which do convey a sense of movement. Actually, these were all rather more adventurous poses than we are graced with at our local life drawing group, and I enjoyed the challenge of trying to analyse them really quickly for key markers and get them on paper within a very limited timescale.
Then, in last week’s life group, we had a clothed female model, tall and willowy, and obviously a favourite of the group as they asked her straight away for a series of 2-minute “movement’ poses – which was ideal again for this exercise, although I was a bit caught out by the way she moved from one pose to the next without even time to turn over the page!!! – certainly focused the mind and the eyes.
I used an HB Nitram stick, and got more confident as I went along in actually making proper use of it towards the end and make bold sweeping marks. The first image is actually two poses (didn’t have time to turn the page) – well caught I think, but too faint and tentative. Second was better but out of proportion, legs too short.
I am pleased with the third – nice bold, committed marks and much better proportion – you can feel the movement in this one, I think.
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