The Figure - The Best of Drawing 2016

Figure The

The Best of

Learn to t o Dr Dra aw In Al Alll Me Medi dia a

Study of Flesh Color and Gold by William Merritt Chase, pastel

Drawing

How to Begin a Figure Drawing

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TABLE of CONTENTS FEATURES 12

The Three-Layer Figure BY JASON FRANZ

Approach the figure through structural analysis and intuitive, layered line. 20

34

The Core Figure: A Source of Power and Accuracy BY DAN GHENO

Much of a figure drawing’s energy—as well as a subject’s likeness—comes from the compelling and accurate representation of the torso. 34

An Unrelenting Gaze: The Drawings of Philip Pearlstein BY JOHN A. PARKS

This celebrated artist uses drawing to depict what he sees with little thought for accepted standards of draftsmanship. 48

Fundamentals of Proportion: Measuring the Figure BY JON DEMARTIN

Using this easy technique, you can measure key proportions in the early stages of drawing and be sure you have an accurate foundation from which to work.

DEPARTMENTS 6

Editor’s Note

10

Contributors

112

Endpaper

COVER IMAGE Study of Flesh Color and Gold by William Merritt Chase, 1888, pastel, 18 x 13. Collection National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC.

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THE FIGURE: TH E BEST OF DRAWING

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Learning From the Masters: Ingres’ Miraculous Lines BY MARK G. MITCHELL

The French master’s graphite drawings teach us much about contour and portraiture. 68

A Many-Sided Approach to the Figure BY AUSTIN R. WILLIAMS

Dan Thompson encourages students to celebrate the complexity of learning how to represent life through drawing. 76

Beauty, Balance & Accuracy BY AUSTIN R. WILLIAMS

Mark Tennant’s drawings evidence both rigorous academic standards and sensitivity to the nuances of the figure. 84

12 Anatomical Differences Between Men and Women

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BY LARRY WITHERS

The differences between male and female bodies range from the obvious to the very subtle, and knowledge of these details can lead us to more informed, realistic figure drawings. 94

Making Lines Move BY JOHN A. PARKS

The drawings of Fred Hatt are as much performances as objects. 102

Lessons From a Drawing Book BY KENNETH J. PROCTER

The figure and portrait drawings that we often come across in textbooks and drawing manuals are there for a reason. Whether we want to learn about chiaroscuro, line, negative space or perspective, these great drawings have much to teach.

Printed in the USA. Copyright © 2016 by F+W Media, Inc., all rights reserved. The contents of this publication may not be reproduced in whole or in part without the consent of the copyright owner, F+W Media, Inc.

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T H E F I G U R E : T H E B E S T O F D R AW I N G

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EDITOR’S NOTE

Figure The

The Best of

Drawing

MANAGING EDITOR

Brian F. Riley SENIOR EDITOR

Austin R. Williams ASSOCIATE EDITOR

Figuratively Speaking

I

n the field of drawing, the human figure captivates and inspires—and, perhaps, frustrates—more artists than any other subject, and learning to draw the figure is practically an artistic discipline of its own. In this special publication, Drawing revisits some of our favorite articles from past issues to investigate the limitless possibilities—and many challenges—of figure drawing. Jason Franz begins our instructional program by suggesting a three-stage process for drawing the �gure (page 12). We next address a question that has stymied us all at one time or another: Where to begin? Dan Gheno suggests that the torso, or core figure, is a good place to start (page 20). Jon deMartin then reveals a simple but remarkably effective way to measure the figure (page 48); Dan Thompson offers 10 directives relating to proportion (page 68); and Larry Withers points out anatomical details artists can use to distinguish women and men (page 84). We also look at the work of accomplished artists, past and present. We trace the career of Philip Pearlstein, one of the most celebrated �gurative artists of our time (page 34). We re�ect on the phenomenal graphite portraits of Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres, which remain a high point in the history of drawing (page 56). We meet two very different contemporary artists in Mark Tennant and Fred Hatt (pages 76 and 94, respectively). And our last article takes us out on top, as Kenneth Procter walks us through some of the great drawings that pop up in one textbook after another to see what we can learn from such artists as Dürer, Prud’hon, Degas and Van Gogh (page 102). We hope these articles illuminate and inspire as you pursue your own artwork. Drawing the �gure is the work of a lifetime, and we all need all the help we can get.

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WHEN COLOR IS STRIPPED AWAY, YOUR SKILL AS AN ARTIST SHINES THROUGH.

Marven , by Cheng Chi-Han, charcoal. Grand-prize winner, 2015 Shades of Gray Competition.

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CONTRIBUTORS JON DE MA RT IN (“Fundamentals of Proportion:

Measuring the Figure”) teaches at Studio Incamminati, Parsons School of Design and Grand Central Atelier. View his work at jondemartin.net. JASON F RA NZ (“The Three-Layer Figure”) has taught

drawing, painting and design at the Art Academy of Cincinnati, Xavier University and the University of Cincinnati. He is the co-founder and executive director of the Cincinnati nonprofit Manifest Creative Research Gallery and Drawing Center (manifestgallery.org). DAN GHENO (“The Core Figure: A Source of Power and

Accuracy”) teaches drawing and painting at the Art Students League of New York and the National Academy School of Fine Arts, both in New York City. His book, Figure Drawing Master Class, is available for purchase at NorthLightShop.com. MARK G. MITCHELL (“Ingres’ Miraculous

Lines”) is an illustrator and author of books for young people.

JOH N A. PAR KS (“An Unrelenting Gaze” and

“Making Lines Move”) is an artist and teacher at the School of Visual Arts and a frequent contributor to Drawing. View his work at johnaparks.com. KENNETH J. PROCTER (“Lessons From a

Drawing Book”) is the dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at Georgia College and State University, in Milledgeville. He can be contacted at [email protected]. AUSTI N R. W ILLI A MS (“A Many-Sided

Approach to the Figure“ and “Beauty, Balance & Accuracy”) is the senior editor of Drawing. LARRY WITHERS (“12 Anatomical Differences

Between Men and Women”) is a founder of On Air Video, Inc. For more information, visit onairvideo.com.

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Three-Layer Figure Approach the figure through structural analysis and intuitive, layered line. by JA S O N

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FRA NZ

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M

y drawing method has evolved alongside my teaching at the college level. The more I’ve had to hone my classroom lessons and philosophy on drawing, the more these lessons have been absorbed into my own working process. In 1998 I decided that in order to be an effective instructor of drawing from life, I would need to demonstrate the rigor and discipline I expected from my students. It was at that point I began working from a live model on a weekly basis, and I continue to do so today. Teaching in both fine art and design programs has developed my current drawing technique—a blend of both disciplines. I have taught college freshman observational drawing with a more basic version of the OPPOSITE PAGE

2010_5_18 (Regal 1) 2010, graphite, 14 x 11.

three-stage process discussed here. In both cases these rules apply: 1. Work simple to complex, light to dark, large to small, and general to specific. 2. Divide your work into three layers. Layer 1: searching, questioning. Layer 2: confirming, defining. Layer 3: refining, unifying. 3. Draw what you see, not what you think you see. 4. Eagerly accept the risk of errors. Let your effort to correct errors become part of the fabric of your work. 5. Embrace time as a medium, alongside paper and pencil, and use it consciously. Work at a rapid pace but understand that your pace will change in each of the three stages. 6. Lines have characteristics, including direction, speed, weight and quality. 7. To determine the weight or density of a line, consider whether the

shape it’s describing is convex or concave, and ask yourself what the function of the line is: Is it to establish an intersection, denote a level of finish or establish a focal point? 8. Drawing from life involves a translation of the three-dimensional world into two-dimensions.

LAYER 1

Searching, Questioning Start by drawing a proportional rectangle into which your subject exactly fits. You want to ensure the correct proportion of height to width, based on your point of view. This enables the subject to be scaled and placed onto the paper exactly where you wish. (A rectangle is easier to move, resize and revise than an entire human figure). The rectangle also

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Illustration 1: 2012_1_24

Illustration 2: 2014_9_2 (post)

2012, colored pencil, 14 x 11.

2014, ballpoint pen, 14 x 11.

supplies a valuable framework for the drawing. Reference points can be created and located relative to the rectangle to confirm the figure’s proportions. (See Illustration 1.) The first reference point is called the anchor , and all other established points are made relative to it. In layer 1 my rectangle often contains within it a triangle, since I work to identify at least three key reference points on the figure. Measure the angle between each point on the subject with a pencil and mark it down on the paper, confirming the angles several times to ensure they’re accurate.

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(All of this groundwork paves the way for a quicker laying-in of the model’s contours, details and character.) This support structure enables the spontaneous and energetic, yet highly accurate, work in the other two layers. Adhering to a measurement process (by means of the reference points) helps the mind convert a three-dimensional subject into two-dimensional data. Concentrating on seeing the model as a collection of points, lines, angles and shapes will help you record what you’re actually seeing rather than what you think you’re seeing.


LAYER 2:

Confirming, Defining In layer 2, define the contours and mass of the various parts of the figure: the head, hips, legs or shoulders, for instance. Here’s where the underlying structure created in layer 1 allows for a gestura l approach at roughing-in the contours. (See Illustration 2.) Work between the general and the specific; let your eyes zoom in and out, focusing on fine details and a narrow range of view (for example, look at eyelashes or the shape of a fingernail) and then back


2015_10_13 2015, ballpoint pen, 11 x 14.

I enjoy taking some parts of a drawing to a more finished state and leaving others at layer 1 or 2; doing so creates a story, a bit of drama, and something more valuable than an equal-all-over completed figure.

2016_1_12 2016, ballpoint pen, 14 x 11.

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TIP: In layer 1, I spend most of my time looking at the subject (getting information) and only a little time looking at the paper (making marks and creative decisions). In layer 2, I divide my time about equally between the two. In layer 3, I spend most of my time looking at the paper—the drawing itself becomes my subject.

up to see the whole figure. Having set up a reliable matrix of lines, you can now spend time almost playfully translating organic masses (muscles, bones, tendons) into line, through spontaneous gestures or even a blind contour approach. The circular marks visible in most of my drawings show where I’m thinking about how I might make the form if I were using clay—rolled into the right shape and pushed into place. They’re my way of marking and establishing the conceptual masses of the interior of the form (as compared to the contour) and sometimes the literal interior, like the skeleton.

LAYER 3

Refining, Unifying In the final layer, refine small details, polish line weights, clarify intersections of line, and bring all the elements together. (See Illustration 3.) You may jump quickly from one part of the figure to the next, looking for relationships in the line work’s weight or quality. While this stage is often the quickest, it’s quite enjoyable. At this stage, I’ll untape the paper from the drawing board, rotate it and spend time working with it upside down or sideways. This change dislodges my tendency to take the information on the page for granted and forces me to see the drawing as an abstract collection of lines which,

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Illustration 3: 2012_1_3 2012, colored pencil, 14 x 11.

nevertheless, must be understood as a human form. I enjoy taking some parts of a drawing to a more finished state and leaving others at layer 1 or 2; doing so creates a story, a bit of drama, and something more valuable than an equal-all-over completed figure. I’ve embraced line drawing because it’s more conceptual and immediate than highly rendered value drawings (although I make those, too). Lines are abstract representations of where surfaces change direction and masses overlap or end. Line drawings do not seek to create an illusion, even while conveying absolute information. There is a certainty in line, and it’s obvious when lines are flawed or incorrect. In this way, they’re demanding of precision and awareness and, therefore, an ideal way to hone skill and perception. 


BE BOLD Use unforgiving media such as ballpoint pen, grayscale markers or colored pencils. Doing so creates an intensity of focus, determination and willingness to let mistakes and corrections become an integral part of the work—and evidence of time spent thinking and rethinking.


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Blueberry Club (detail) By Elizabeth Kenyon (pastel on paper, 10x12)

THE CORE FIGURE: A Source of Power and Accuracy Much of a figure drawing’s energy—as well as a subject’s likeness—comes from the compelling and accurate representation of the torso. by

W

DAN GHENO

here do I start? That’s a question that most artists— advanced or beginner—face when making a figure drawing. Is it best to start with the head and hang the body below it? Should you first draw the chair that the model is sitting on? Or the feet? Or the torso? Artists can start with whatever they prefer, but the soul and core of the figure is the torso, or as I call it, the core figure. To see the power of the core figure, look at any of the many broken Greek and Roman torso fragments in museums. The inherent beauty and power of the core figure speaks for itself in these fragments. You can infer most of the remaining pose with great certainty just based upon the gesture of the surviving core figure. The torso is possibly the most important body part, and its mastery is essential to the creation of a dynamic figure drawing and even to a close-up portrait. This article will examine some “obvious” and some not-so-obvious facts about the human torso, its anatomical and superficial structure and how this knowledge can be used to give your figure drawings more dimension, gesture and character.

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OVERVIEW OF THE CORE FIGURE Sometimes in drawing—as in many areas of life—the most obvious and elementary facts are the most essential. The basic facts governing the construction of the human figure are frequently ignored by beginners who are eager to move on to seemingly more sophisticated concepts, and they also are often overlooked by advanced artists who dismiss them or who never learned them. Too many artists think of the torso as a static and solid form. The torso is actually an inherently dynamic form that consists of two chief interacting structures—the pelvis and the chest—plus the smaller but nevertheless crucial shoulder girdle (which consists of the free-floating shoulder blades, or scapulae, and the collar bones). Where they connect into the torso, the roots of the arms, legs and neck should also be considered an integral part of the core figure. The scapulae intrude into the torso with the greatest frequency and dramatic effect. When pushed inward by the arms, as demonstrated in Michelangelo’s A Male Nude Seen From Behind , the scapulae bunch up

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A Male Nude Seen From Behind

by Michelangelo, ca. 1539–1541, black chalk, 11½ x 9 3 ⁄ 16 . Collection British Museum, London, England. Notice how the arms influence the structure of the rib cage, pushing the shoulder blades toward the body’s center and causing the overlying muscles to bulge outward.


THE FIGURE: THE BEST OF DRAWING

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ABOVE

Archers Shooting at a Herm by Michelangelo, ca. 1530, red chalk, 8 5 ⁄ 8 x 12 3 ⁄ 4 . Collection Royal Library, Windsor, England. On a standing figure, the pelvis tends to cant forward, and the rib cage tilts backward. This is often the case in a running person as well. LEFT

Gesture by Dan Gheno, 2009, sanguine crayon, 17 x 8. Collection the artist. In this drawing, an example of drawthrough, the form of the rib cage is first indicated by a faint, quick and loosely sketched elliptical shape. The form of the breasts and arm are added later, after the gesture of the core figure has been established.

the upper torso’s muscles, almost completely obscuring the more tubular form of the rib cage underneath. Although the individual chest and pelvic body par ts are themselves immobile, the torso is highly mobile in the midsection, linked in the back by the flexible spine and in the front by the stomach muscle. It’s extremely important to remember that the chest and pelvis always move in opposition to each other. In a standing pose, the chest tilts backward and the pelvis tilts forward. In a seated pose it is the opposite, with the pelvis tilting backward and the chest tilting forward. This principle may seem elementary, but ignore it at your own risk. Called contrapposto by Italian Old Master artists, this elegant counterpoint of the chest and pelvis governs the gesture throughout the overall figure.

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The neck tends to tilt forward in reaction to the chest’s backward lean. Meanwhile, the front muscles of the upper leg swing forward in opposition to the tilt of the pelvis, continuing the back-and-forth rhythmic movement that starts in the core figure and persists downward through the entire length of the leg. You’ll see this back-and-forth movement magnified when your subject wears high heels. It even holds true in a running pose, as you can see in Michelangelo’s Archers Shooting at a Herm. Furthermore, if one hip is pushed up by the supporting leg, as in Johnson’s Academic Drawing (page 24), then the corresponding shoulder above slants downward in compensation. This principle of contrapposto manifests itself in many ways throughout the core figure. But there are many exceptions to this “rule,” particularly when the model raises an arm or places a hand on a hip. Then, the shoulder on that side rises up, whether or not it’s located above the supporting leg, as shown in Sargent’s Standing Male Nude, With Raised Right Arm (page 26).

vertebral column governs the torso shape and all the resulting zigza g rhythms that run through the body. The spine is made up of four reciprocating curves (see Figure 1 on page 25). Starting at the bottom of the spine and moving up, the first curve begins at the tail bone, where the spine cants outward. Second, the spine curves inward just below the rib cage. It then angles up and back along the lower portion of the rib cage and continues to curve around the bulk of the rib cage. Finally, it tilts inward again at the top of the chest, leading into the neck and the underside of the skull. Notice how the spine moves fluidly into the neck. In your drawing, make sure the line of the spine links up with the neck rather than aiming toward some indeterminate point outside the figure. The rib cage is also an indispensable part of the torso’s structure, but don’t get intimidated by the individual ribs. It’s much more important to understand the chest’s basic planar structure (Figure 2, A on page 25) and the general angular thrust of the ribs (Figure 2, B), starting high on the backside of the chest and looping down toward the front.

Seated

by Dan Gheno, 2009, colored p encil and white charcoal on toned paper, 24 x 18. Collection the artist. The pelvis tends to tip backward in a seated figure, and the chest slumps forward.

THE INNER SKELETAL STRUCTURE A little knowledge about anatomy can be dangerous—some beginners become too preoccupied with anatomy and strain to find muscles on the model where their eyes see none. On the other hand, many advanced artists prematurely skip over the basics of anatomy in their headlong rush to make “art.” It’s imperative that all artists draw from the skeleton at some point in their training and make themselves familiar with the bony foundations of the human form. All the bones are valuable to study, none more so than the spine, or vertebral column. Bounded by a group of parallel, pillarlike muscles called the erector spinae, or erectors of the spine, the



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Academic Drawing by Johnson, vine and compressed charcoal on Michallet paper, 24½ x 18½. Collection the Art Students League of New York; New York, New York. In a standing pose, the side of the pelvis above the supporting leg tips upward. Meanwhile, the shoulder above the supporting leg usually angles downward in compensation.

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LEFT

Figure 1 by Dan Gheno, 20 10, sanguine crayon, 8 x 6. Collection the artist. The spine—and consequently the gesture of the torso—is built on a foundation of four major reciprocating, curving actions.

4 A

RIGHT

Figure 2 by Dan Gheno, 20 10, sanguine crayon, 12 x 9. Collection the artist. The rib cage tends to be tubular, and the pelvis is relatively boxlike in nature. The chest is not simplistically curvaceous however; it contains plane breaks such as the one that occurs at (A).

3

B

BELOW LEFT

D

Figure 3 by Dan Gheno, 20 10, sanguine crayon, 12 x 9. Collection the artist.

2

C

1

Look for the bilateral relationships governing the torso, found in lines that run through the shoulders (G), across the nipples, below the breasts (F), along the base of the rib cage (E) and spanning the top of the pelvis (C). Compare these widths to the more shallow depths of the side planes found in the pelvis (D) and the chest.

G

THE CORE FIGURE’S

C

SUPERFICIAL STRUCTURE

H

F E D C

I


The superficial structures of the pelvis and rib cage are another not-so-obvious aspect of the core figure that is worth understanding. Think of the pelvis as a boxlike shape and the chest as an angular, tubelike shape, as in Figure 2. Called form concepts, some artists have difficulty identifying them when looking at the more varied, complex forms of the model in front of them. I often use imaginary construction lines when trying to define these forms on my paper, utilizing what is known as bilateral symmetry to establish the model’s basic volumetric forms. As in the example in Figure 3, you can lightly sketch bilateral construction lines to chart the front-plane relationship of the pelvis using the frontal bony points of the pelvic crest (C) as your landmarks. Then, compare this front plane to the shallower side plane (C to D). For the chest, draw traverse construction lines across the lower points of the rib cage (E), spanning the base of the breasts (F) and along the outside edges of the shoulder girdle (G). As with the pelvis, compare the chest’s slightly curving front plane to its more shallow side plane. You should always tr ust your eye while drawing the model from life, but it helps to keep these form concepts of the chest and pelvis in the back of your mind as you draw the model’s visible forms. Besides helping you to intuit the sculptural volumes of the figure, lightly sketching these form concepts helps you see what your eye often misses. On a side view, for instance, many artists draw the breast or pectoralis in loving detail but forget to place the


25

Standing Male Nude With Raised Right Arm by John Singer Sargent, ca. 189 0–1915, charcoal, 24 3 ⁄ 4 x 19. Collection Harvard Ar t Museum, Cambridge, Massachusetts. You always need to trust your eyes, since there are many exceptions to the so-called rules. Here, the shoulder does not slope downward over the supportive leg, because the model is lifting his arm—and his shoulder along with it.

supporting rib cage underneath. I’ve made that mistake often, so I now first draw a loose, elliptical shape for the basic position of the chest, and I later add pectoralis or breast shapes on top. Linking these two form concepts of the chest and pelvis together is the centerline (Figure 3, H). Perhaps the most crucial of all your imaginary construction lines, the centerline controls all the complex movements in the torso. This imaginary line is real enough in the vertebral column, which serves as a natural centerline. Establish the line of the spine early on in the drawing process, especially when drawing a back view or a side view. When drawing a front view, you need to look a little harder to find a centerline. It starts at the pit of the neck, runs down the center of the chest

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through the stomach and finishes in the crotch. Look for the angles and tilts of the centerline; on an averagesize person, it tilts out at the chest, sometimes swings inward below the chest, moves out again around the belly button and dives back in toward the crotch. The front centerline is most descriptive and easiest to find on a side view or three-quarter’s view, but it is more difficult to grasp when looking at the model straight on from a flat frontal or back view— the centerline almost appears to be straight up-and-down at first glance. However, there will always be some slight back-and-forth thrust to the centerline. A problem often occurs where the centerline spans the distance between the belly button and the pubis. Many artists put the pubis directly below the belly button as if on a vertical plumb line. But because of the severe backward tilt in t he pelvis—most obviously on women—the centerline usually cuts inward from the belly button as it makes its way toward the pubis. If there is even a small amount of turn to the figure away from the straighton view, this inward position of the pubis is greatly magnified. Looking at the dynamic, highly foreshortened Watteau drawing at right, observe how the large forms of the chest and pelvis interlock with each other. The erector spinae muscles on the back and the stomach muscles on the front serve as the transitional shackle between these two forms. When seen from above, these bridging forms will seem to originate on the chest and insert into the pelvis. The opposite is true when viewing the figure from below—these front and back bridging forms then seem to stem from the pelvis and stab into the chest. Whenever possible, look for similar overlapping concentric lines that help reinforce those all-important basic form concepts underlying the core figure. You’ll find them often


in the creases that flow through the stomach area and the stretch marks that develop between the rib cage and the pelvis in an action pose with a lot of twist. On athletic models, pay particularly close attention to the descriptive edges of their muscle shapes. Far from the flat, maplike shapes found in 2-D anatomical charts, real muscles conform to the 3-D curvature and angular plane changes of the human body. When viewed from above, as in Carracci’s A Triton Blowing a Conch, notice how their shapes are visually warped into a subtle downward-facing manner. This arcing distortion of the muscles is similar to the way a straight line drawn around a barrel curves downward when viewed from above—although this effect is far more restrained on the human figure. Conversely, that barrel line and the more complicated muscular shapes of the human body bow upward when the forms are seen from below. Just remember when drawing the figure, this visual torquing distortion is only slight and never evenly circular like the stylized muscles found on many cartoon figures.


BEGINNING A FIGURE DRAWING The question of “Where do I start?” remains. Even though it’s imperative to establish a dynamically gestural core figure early on, you can’t just drop a fully drawn torso onto the paper—you still need to put your first line somewhere. I usually “start” with the head, scribbling a loose loop or circular shape for its basic size—and not much more. This gives me a preliminary sense of size of the rest of the figure and helps me to gauge whether it will fit properly within the space I’ve allotted for it in my composition. It’s important to establish the overall gesture of the figure near the beginning of the drawing process; you need to have something to aim for, even if you prefer to work with details from the outset. If you are unsure about your sense of proportion, you may want to quickly place light tic marks on your paper to indicate the top, middle, bottom and quarter points of the model’s overall lengths. Once you have secured the general gesture and proportions of the figure on your paper—however simplistically—you can deal with the more complex problems of form and surface details later as they come up. Quite a few artists from the Renaissance to more recent times have codified the many natural lines of action or rhythm that physically course through the core figure. It’s useful to study charts such as the one by the anonymous Milanese master (page 29) or to investigate Frank Riley’s teachings on the subject. Sometimes the core figure’s lines of rhythm can be as simple as two overlapping triangular shapes. But in the end, when standing in front of your drawing board, it’s best to trust your own eye. Just get something down, even if it is only some doodly lines, to establish the general slant, length and width of the figure.

Study for a Satyr About to Attack by Antoine Watteau, ca. 1717, red, black and w hite chalk, 4 1 ⁄ 4 x 83 ⁄ 8 . Frits Lugt Collection, Foundation Custodia, Paris, France. When viewed from above, notice how the form concept of the chest overlaps the form concept of the pelvis. These are seemingly separate units, yet they are dynamically connected by the hint of the stomach muscles in the front and the spine muscles on the back.


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GETTING A LIKENESS

ABOVE

A Triton Blowing a Conch by Agostino Carracci, ca. 1597–1601, black and white chalk on light blue-gray paper, 16 x 9½. Collection J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, California. Notice the downward-curving quality of the muscle shapes in this drawing of a figure viewed from above, similar to the downward-facing curve found in a cylinder viewed from above. OPPOSITE PAGE

Geometrical Scheme of Movements of the Body by Anonymous Milanese artist. Collection The Morgan Library & Museum, New York, New York. In every era, artists have studied and charted the many internal rhythms found within the human figure. Old Masters such as Leonardo, Dürer, and this anonymous artist left many diagrams for us to study. Although these charts are useful to look at, it’s also very important to observe the human figure yourself. Notice how body parts relate to each other, finding rhythmic relationships between them, whether in size or in some sort of curving alignment.

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Don’t let your drawings become stylized or schematic in your attempt to draw a dynamic core figure. Remember that a torso is as unique to a person as his or her face. I use the same method for finding a “likeness” in the torso as I do when drawing a portrait. Much as the face can be divided into major sections, the torso can be defined into three segments. Starting at the top, these areas are: from the pit of the neck to the nipples; from the nipples to the belly button; and from the bellybutton to the crotch (or symphysis pubis). In many classical canons, these segments are defined as equally long. But as with the face, there is much variation within human torsos. Among women in particular, the distance between the pit of the neck and nipples can differ quite greatly from the norm—mostly because of variable breast sizes and whether the breasts sit high or low on the ribcage. When contemplating these three segments, ask yourself which segment is the longest and which is the shortest. You won’t be able to establish the likeness of your model unless you first determine these bigger proportional relationships, and finding what distinguishes each face and figure from the norm will also allow you to determine what distinguishes each model as a unique individual. Don’t dismiss the importance of finding the torso’s likeness, or you may set off a chain reaction of proportional problems throughout the rest of your figure if, like many artists, you compare the length of your limbs to landmarks on the core figure. For instance, I often compare the position of the elbow to the lower edge of the rib cage—the elbow usually relates to this part of the torso aligned along an imaginary, gently curving line that crosses a little bit above or below the rib cage. But if I make the nipple-tobelly-button segment too long, I’ll




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consequently make the upper arm too long and the lower arm too short. The next time that you think an arm, leg or other body part looks proportionally out of whack even though it measures correctly against the core figure, make sure that you haven’t drawn one of the three major torso segments inaccurately as well.

IS THE TORSO TOO WIDE OR TOO THIN? Sometimes a form appears too long when, in fact, it is too thin, or too short when really it is too wide. Perhaps you’ve had this problem when sketching a side view: Your drawn torso seems to measure correctly, but it appears either too short or too long to your eye. Quite often, artists misplace the lower curving line of the buttock where it inserts into the leg, putting it either too low or too high compared to the crotch on the front. In general, this gluteal insertion point resides high on the male form, whereas on the female form the line usually drops low into the leg, well below the crotch. But always do a visual double-check on the actual model, using a horizontal plumb line to compare the insertion of the buttock with the position of the crotch. If your core figure looks too long or short on a front view, take a second look at the position of the inner thighs where they overlap the pelvis (Figure 3, I on page 25). Artists often draw this inner position of the leg too high within the figure, making the torso look too short. This happens a lot when the figure is standing on one leg. In most cases, artists usually position the upper line of the thigh correctly on the supportive leg. However, they often place the line of the thigh too high on the other side, not taking into account that the pelvis tilts downward on the nonsupported side, so the upper line of the leg that connects

RIGHT

Study of an Antique Venus by Michelangelo, ca. 1524–1525, black chalk, 1 1 10 ⁄ 16 x 7 ⁄ 16 . Collection British Museum, London, England. Here, the flexed side of the figure is active in its outside contour, and the opposite stretched side is relatively passive in its outer shape. OPPOSITE PAGE

Academic Drawing by Richard Tweedy, 1894–1899, vine charcoal, 24½ x 18¾. Collection the Art Students League of New York; New York, New York. The pelvis often slopes downward to one side, as in this drawing. The inner line of the leg that connects into the downward side of pelvis should follow it as well, sitting lower than the line that describes the inner thigh of the other, higher leg.

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into it should be lower as well. But there are times when a portion of the core figure is indeed too wide in comparison to the rest of the figure. This happens frequently when artists agonize too much over internal details within their core figures. They unconsciously expand the outside edges of the torso in order to squeeze in all the details they’ve added to the internal surface form. Sometimes it’s just a matter of one side of the figure being too large, in which case you can either shrink it or enlarge the other side. But most often when you are having width problems, it’s not that simple, and you need to readjust both sides of the figure. Before you change anything on your drawing, always go back to the centerline and reassess the entire torso from top to bottom, comparing the widths on one side of the torso’s centerline to the widths on the other side. Start at the shoulders, since that is where most width problems reside. For instance, you may perceive that the shoulders are too wide, even though their exterior width measures correctly against other proportions. In this case, look at the position of the armpits—artists often position them too far apart, particularly on large or muscular people. And remember that you usually can’t reposition one armpit without repositioning the other. Another problem area when drawing the torso in a three-quarters view is that artists often make the distant buttock too large—bigger even than the nearer one. In this situation, take another look at the position of the gluteal fold on the model. Although never in perfect alignment with the spine, it should line up somewhat and not be wildly to one side or the other. Drawing both sides of the torso in relationship to each other can be especially helpful when you draw the figure from life. Your model is a living, breathing human and will inevitably move at least a little within the time it takes to complete a drawing. In my career as a teacher, I have seen many advanced artists work obsessively on one side




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of the figure. They then work just as obsessively on the other side, without noticing that the model has rotated away from them, exposing more of the model’s opposite side. Finally, when they add this extra piece of anatomy to their drawing, they wonder why their figure looks too wide. You can eliminate or minimize this pernicious problem by intermittently looking back and forth across the width and length of the model’s forms.

AVOI DING BALLOON TORSOS

Core Figure 1 2 . Collection the artist. by Dan Gheno, 2009, sanguine crayon, 15 x 7 ⁄

It’s always important to find an anchor or focal point in your drawing. When concentrating on a torso-only drawing, try to let the rendering gradually taper away in definition. Don’t end the drawing hard at a joint or form edge.

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THE FIGURE: T HE BEST OF DRAWING

Another common problem occurs when an artist draws the torso too symmetrically. It’s always a good idea to draw back and forth across the width of the core figure—when you place a line on the paper for one side of the rib cage, put a line down for the other side. However, try not to automatically make one side of the torso equal to the other, like a balloon. There is nothing worse than drawing a balloon torso—unless, of course, that is your goal. It’s a common problem for beginning artists who fall into the trap of thinking the figure is symmetrical on all sides, something that even many advanced artists are ensnared by when drawing heavy or muscular models. To help free yourself of this mindset, try to draw the model from the skeleton outward. Notice that there is comparatively less fat on the back of the torso. Even on extremely heavy models, most of the fat hangs from the lower, front side of the rib cage— the back side of the torso will seem relatively flat compared to the front of the stomach. You will observe this most readily when drawing the torso from a side view. Begin your drawing by laying in the spine, rib cage and the boxlike shape of the pelvis. Notice that the stomach does indeed bulge outward below the rib cage. But rather than bulging like an evenly


circular balloon, the stomach slopes outward and downward in a series of flat angles from the arch of the rib cage where it originates. The stomach tends to level out above the belly button and then quickly dives back inward toward the crotch. As you draw down the core figure, remember the active/passive rule that exists within all living things: If one side of the form is active, the other side is usually passive. This is most noticeable in the limbs, but when drawing the core figure in action, as in Michelangelo’s Study of an Antique Venus (page 30), you will notice that the stretched, extended side of the torso appears relatively flat and “passive,” and the other flexed side, with its compressed skin and muscles, looks pronounced and “active.” Never assume that any part of the human anatomy is absolutely symmetrical. Although you might think that a stationary torso balanced on both legs is symmetrical when viewed from the front, look again. You will find some subtle amount of asymmetry in its forms, and this slight lopsidedness is what differentiates your living, breathing model from a lifeless, stylized mannequin. The torso’s internal, interlocking shadow shapes often accentuate this natural asymmetry.

USING AN ANCHOR When working with a live model, your time is usually limited, and it’s easy to lose track of time when rendering many details and internal shadow shapes. Although it’s important to work globally throughout the figure, no matter how good a multitasker you are, it’s critical to find a couple of focal points—an anchor —in your drawing. Concentrate the majority of your efforts there so that if you run out of time, you will have at least refined the most crucial areas of the drawing, and your figure will have a look of completion. In most of the drawings reproduced in this article, the artists found their anchor in the all-important core figure.


Further drawing instruction by Dan Gheno is available in the book Figure Drawing Master Class. For more

information, visit northlightshop.com/ figure-drawingmaster-class.

Daniel

by Gianlorenzo Bernini, 1655, red chalk on paper, 14¾ x 9¼. Collection Museum der Bildenden Künste, Leipzig, G ermany. Although intended as a stud y for a sculpture, this drawing has survived the test of time while other sketches from the same period have perished. This drawing lives on because of Bernini’s elegant line work, balanced composition and rhythmic focus on the core figure.

Take the highly rendered Academic Drawing by Richard Tweedy (page 31) and Bernini’s quick working sketch for a sculpture seen above. Tweedy seems to have stopped when he ran out of time, and Bernini seems to have stopped when he had satisfied his research needs. More than likely, both artists knew their time limits and/or had an end goal for their drawings. It is not pure luck that these drawings have survived the test of time when millions of others have perished. From a compositional point of view, both artists stopped their drawings at very opportune places within the figures, not at a joint or at the edge of a body part. The artists created a transitional passageway within their drawings, concentrating on their anchor point of the core figure and letting the details fade out past the border of the torso.

REACHING THE END Knowing where to stop a drawing is almost as important as knowing where to start it. Let’s face it: It’s hard not to get lost in the joy of details. Always remember that the torso sits at the core of the figure—all the individual body par ts and seemingly important details emanate off the core figure’s inherently dynamic, gestural  structure. For me, the drawing both starts and stops with the core figure.


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An Unrelenting Gaze: The Drawings of Philip Pearlstein This celebrated artist uses drawing to depict what he sees with little thought for accepted standards of draftsmanship. by J O H N

A . PA R K S

P

hilip Pearlstein (1924–) emerged as a major force behind the resurgence of representational painting in the New York art world in the early 1960s. At a time when Abstract Expressionism still held sway and the wry sophistication of Pop Art was in its early stages, Pearlstein came up with a vision that swept aside most of the tenets of Modernism and its insistence on surface and flatness. In his edgy, intense drawings and paintings he championed a return to the creation of an illusionistic space behind the picture plane observed from a single viewpoint. Moreover, he proposed to take on a central concern of Western painting: the direct observation and rendering of the human figure. His paintings of nudes, presented in a raw, detached and highly concentrated realism, devoid of either the painterly excesses of the Abstract Expressionists or the layered ironies of Pop Art, came as a complete surprise to the art world and quickly propelled the painter to international recognition. Throughout his career the artist has made drawings, and at times— particularly in the 1950s—his drawings led the way to considerable breakthroughs in his work. To fully understand how Pearlstein’s mature

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Seated Female Model and Male Model on Quilt 1973, sepia wash on paper, 30⅜ x 22¾ . All artwork and images this article courtesy Betty Cuningham Gallery, New York, New York, unless otherwise indicated.

Dra win gMag azi ne .co m



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Male Nude Reclining 1948, charcoal, 19 x 25.

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work came about, it is necessary to go back to the very beginning of his career.

P

hilip Pearlstein was born in Pittsburgh in 1924 and grew up during the Great Depression. He was encouraged by his parents and teachers to paint and draw and was sent off to the Carnegie Museum of Art for Saturday morning art classes. All this youthful activity culminated in early recognition when he won a national competition for high-school students, resulting in two of his paintings being reproduced in Life magazine in June 1942. The young man went on to study art as an undergraduate, but his life was interrupted by World War II. The army used Pearlstein’s talents, employing him in a graphic workshop in Florida, where he worked for several months on signs and illustrations for army training. There he found himself in the company of men who had worked in commercial art in civilian life, and from them he quickly learned the techniques of the trade, becoming familiar with ruling pens and silkscreen printing. L ater Pearlstein was sent to Italy in the infantry, again finding himself working in a shop that was making road signs for the war-torn country. In Italy he made a long series of drawings depicting typical events in the life of a soldier. The drawings have a straightforwardness in which every element is clearly readable. “I guess I was going to be an illustrator,” says the artist, “and that is a quality that illustration needs.” Pearlstein was kept on in Italy after hostilities were over, and he used the opportunity to see art that had been hidden during the war. He also visited the Vatican collections and the churches of Venice, and he remembers paying caretakers in Florence to get into locked



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Study for Eroded Cliff 1955, s epia wash on pa per, 18¾ x 23⅞ .

churches to see pictures by the great Renaissance painters. Returning to the United States, Pearlstein went back to Carnegie Tech to finish his training. One of his classroom friends was the young Andrew Warhola (1928–1987), with whom Pearlstein eventually made his way to New York in 1949. The two shared an apartment and both found work, Warhola—or Warhol, as he eventually came to be known— in illustration and Pearlstein as an assistant to a graphic designer. After about 10 months or so Warhol had become a successful illustrator. The two parted company when Pearlstein got married.

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For nearly eight years Pearlstein worked for Ladislav Sutnar (1897– 1976), a graphic designer with close ties to the Bauhaus—a school in Germany that combined crafts and the fine arts—and Pearlstein absorbed much of the Bauhaus aesthetic. At this time he was also involved with a group of painters that included Willem de Kooning (1904–1997) and Philip Guston (1913–1980), and in 1954 he joined the Tanager Gallery, one of the first co-op galleries in the city. “Really it was like a graduate school for me,” says Pearlstein. “People like Greenberg or Guston would just stop by and chat. One morning, I found De Kooning sleeping on the steps outside when I went to open up the gallery. I had an exhibition of paintings up, and he eventually came in


and asked if he could talk about the work. He took me through each of the paintings in turn, talking about them in my terms rather than those of his own paintings. It was the best critique I ever got.” Following the lead of the Abstract Expressionists, Pearlstein’s paintings at the time were heavily painted but not exactly abstract. He produced images based on popular American culture—including an American Eagle, a dollar sign and eventually Superman—in the early 1950s, years before Pop Art was born. Clement Greenberg (1909–1994) spotted Pearlstein and included him in an “Emerging Talent” show in 1954. Meanwhile, with the encouragement of Sutnar, Pearlstein enrolled for a master’s degree at the Institute of Fine Arts at New York University.


Pearlstein wrote his thesis on the work of Francis Picabia (1879–1953), and it may have been the study of this artist that moved Pearlstein to begin doubting the orthodox viewpoint championed by Greenberg. Rather than a grand advancement toward flatness and the dominance of the picture plane, Picabia’s work—with its lively and inventive shifts between Cubism, Dadaism and Surrealism— suggested that all kinds of approaches might be viable. Another important development was the artist’s association with Mercedes Matter (1913–2001), an artist who would go on to found the New York Studio School of Drawing, Painting and Sculpture. In the late


1950s she began to invite a number of artists to make figure drawings in her studio during six-hour marathons on Sunday evenings. Pearlstein, who had moved uptown, welcomed the chance to fraternize with fellow artists but quickly discovered an intense working atmosphere. The poses were simple and natural rather than the classical contortions favored in the art schools. In the early days poses were short—10 minutes or so—and Pearlstein drew quickly, either with a soft 6B pencil on hard drawing paper or with brush and raw-umber watercolor on charcoal paper and later on Arches watercolor paper. The lighting was bright and overhead as opposed to the soft directional

lighting so often adopted in the art schools of the time. From the earliest examples it is clear that these drawings were anything but classical. They were generally executed in a continuous line that developed from an attempt at completely direct seeing. The artist was obviously trying to confront the problem of rendering head-on, without recourse to any preconceived standards of draftsmanship. He started almost anywhere on the body and followed the form wherever it might have led. This approach

Tree Roots Clutching 1959, se pia was h on paper, 13⅞ x 16¾ .


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“I accept what I do. I don’t second-guess myself. The drawing is a result of considerable concentration and intense effort on my part. If that is the way I saw it then I stand by it.”

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BELOW LEFT

Male Model Seated on Floor 1962, sepia wash on paper, 13⅞ x 16⅞ . BELOW RIGHT

Female Sitting Up, Male Reclining 1962, graphite, 13 ¾ x 16⅞ .

sometimes resulted in oddities or quirks in the drawing that the artist chose to keep. Indeed, the drawings of this era, like the drawings that would come in later decades, show little or no signs of correction or erasure. “I accept what I do,” says the artist. “I don’t second-guess myself. The drawing is a result of considerable concentration and intense effort on my part. If that is the way I saw it then I stand by it.”

I

t was a long time before this early figure work was to yield fruit as paintings. Throughout the 1950s Pearlstein painted Abstract Expressionist landscapes, often


based on rocks that he collected outdoors. These paintings, hovering between abstraction and traditional landscape, were very much part of the artistic currency of the day, and Pearlstein was able to show them and garner some support. In 1958 he won a Fulbright grant and went to live for a year in Italy, where he continued his landscape work. The drawings and watercolors he made at this time, however, show an increasing realism and a tendency to render more precisely and fully. This year also marked the end of Pearlstein’s work as a graphic artist. Upon his return to New York from Italy he began teaching at Pratt Institute and went on to


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teach at Brooklyn College for many years. It wasn’t until 1962 that Pearlstein first showed his figure drawings at the Allan Frumkin Gallery, in New York. After the Abstract Ex pressionist years, in which the figure had only been acceptable if it was charged with enormous emotion and painterly drama, the cool, almost clinically detached quality of Pearlstein’s drawings came as somewhat of a shock to the art world. There was also the curious quality of images in which two nude people were displayed in a situation that was potentially sexual but which, in fact, involved nothing

Seated Female Model and Leaning Male Model undated (1960 s), graphite, 18 x 23 ¾.

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more than posed figures forming a dynamic composition. The artist began making paintings from his drawings and eventually painted directly from the model. The resulting pictures were a considerable departure from his early work, eventually dropping all the heavy manipulation of paint favored by the Abstract Expressionists and instead using a lean and economic style. In part the artist attributes this evolution toward a more precise t reatment to leaving the world of graphic design. “Once I wasn’t doing it for a living the same impulse went into the painting,” he says. Another more prosaic event also increased his interest in precision. In the late 1950s Pearlstein worked for a few months for Life magazine where, for insurance purposes, he was given


a routine medical exam that included an eye test. “I had been wearing the same prescription lenses since high school,” he says. “When I was in the army they just copied the prescription, and I never thought to change it. When the doctor popped a different set of lenses into the apparatus I suddenly saw the world jump into sharp clarity for the first time. I said, ‘Give me those!’ It was such a pleasure seeing clearly I never wanted to look at an Impressionist painting again.” In the early 1960s Pearlstein had three young children and money was tight. Nevertheless, he took the plunge and began hiring his own models. Right from the beginning he carefully controlled the studio conditions. He used three blue-tinged floodlights facing slightly toward the wall, and he curtained the windows


to keep out daylight. Painfully conscious of the cost of paying a model, Pearlstein worked quickly, vowing to complete each painting in a limited number of hours, further contributing to the sense of directness in his paintings. The drawings of this period remained linear and were completed in either graphite or brush, with the artist favoring a Chinese brush that allowed him a combination of delicate line and broader swaths for washes. As he tended to begin in the middle of the paper and work along the forms as he found them, the resulting images would often be cropped when he finally arrived at the edges. Heads, feet or any other part of the body might be missing. For the viewer the effect can be somewhat alarming, but the artist is comfortable with this as long as he feels the image makes sense. Pearlstein attributes part of his interest in cropping to his time at Life magazine, where he would often be obliged to crop photos. “I became more interested in what was left on the outside after the image was cropped,” he says. The artist acknowledges that in his drawings a sort of reverse cropping takes place. The image travels and unfolds until it reaches the edge and is stopped. If the edge is slicing through a thigh or a breast or a neck, the artist simply accepts the outcome. Some of the drawings of this early period introduce a further device: a broken or dotted line that the artist used to notate a surface feature for later work in another medium. The line might show the position of a bone or muscle beneath the surface or merely indicate the edge of a cast shadow. The artist is clearly interested in limiting his observation to visual events rather than looking for visual clues that will enable him to render a fully volumetric form along classical lines. He accepts the distortions, quirks and flattening of space that often result from this approach because his faith is grounded in the


authenticity of the act of looking. In a sense Pearlstein is making art more closely related to that of Cézanne than that of the academies—the appearance of the work is dictated by the process of looking at the world. Pearlstein showed his paintings at the Frumkin Gallery in 1963 and received an enthusiastic review from Sydney Tillim, an important critic at the time, who recognized that Pearlstein had returned to a traditional concern of art—the depiction of the human being in real space from a single viewpoint—without having recourse to all the baggage of that tradition. Gone were the academic poses and the carefully balanced compositions of academic

Foreshortened Nude

1966, black wash on paper, 29⅞ x 22.


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ABOVE LEFT

ABOVE RIGHT

Female Model on Chrome Stool, Male Model on Floor

Two Female Models on Peruvian Rug With Mirror

1978, sepia wash on paper, 40 x 59 ¾. Private collection.

1976, sepia wash on paper, 29½ x 41.

art, and gone were the drama and angst of Expressionism. They had been replaced by a cool, fearless and unrelenting gaze. The models remained in relaxed and more or less natural resting poses. There was no attempt at gesture, interaction, storytelling, idealization or any of the other garnishings of representational painting. The pictures looked radical, groundbreaking and somewhat challenging. Pearlstein quickly gained a wide reputation.

A

s the 1960s progressed, the focus in the paintings sharpened. Moreover, the backgrounds and physical contexts of the models were worked up to the same hard finish. Gradually the artist started to include one or two props, usually furnishings from his own house: a sofa, a chair, a carpet. Often these objects played pivotal roles in the composition, reflecting and reinforcing movements that occur through the figures. Pearlstein also

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began to introduce pieces of heavily patterned textiles, a move that involved the challenge of reflected color and dynamic shifts between the subtleties of flesh color and the brilliant local color of the fabrics. Since the early 1980s, Pearlstein has been making increasingly complex paintings and drawings in which his nudes are joined by a wide array of props. These artifacts are drawn from the artist’s large collection of American folk art. The nudes are suddenly entangled in compositions that might include a large model airplane along with a child’s car-plane toy. Wooden rocking horses and model fire engines compete with antique chairs and weather vanes, crowding and threatening the human models with their sharp edges and hard surfaces. With so many powerful images at play, the viewer is naturally tempted to look for meaning in the work. Surely a pair of nude women, dozing while a zeppelin dives vertically between them, must be an image of war and destruction. Or perhaps not. “I’m making puzzles for future art historians,” quips the artist, who points out that it is difficult, if not impossible, to control the meaning of a work of art because the context in which it is seen is always changing.


It seems that what Pearlstein is up to in these paintings is to overload the work with symbols, signifiers and potential meanings so that in the end they simply point us back, exhausted, to the electric pleasures of seeing the objects and models themselves. “I posed one model with a diving airplane and a model of Mickey Mouse,” says the artist. “The model told me that the work was certainly a comment on 9/11 with Mickey Mouse standing for American culture. I told him that I was more interested in how the shape of his hairline mirrored that of Mickey. I think he got a bit upset, and after the painting was done he shaved his head.” Pearlstein has remained active into his 80s and 90s. A visit several years ago to his studio in Manhattan’s Garment District found him working on several very large canvases, aided by three models. The artist’s collection of American folk art is joined by collections of Roman and Greek fragments, Egyptian pots, Japanese prints and much more. Pearlstein takes obvious delight in exploring his collection with a visitor, making it clear that the pleasures of looking and the enjoyment of discovering how other artists have seen the world continue to fuel the creative energy of this wonderful  and important artist.


ABOVE

Two Seated Models, One on Eames Chair 198 2, charc oal, 30 ¼ x 44⅛ . LEFT

Model With Leg Extended on Wooden Bench 1983, Conté, 30 x 40.



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LEFT

Nude and New York

1985, graphite, 23 x 29. BELOW LEFT

Male Model With Foot on Barber Chair

undated, sepia wash on paper, 41¾ x 29⅜ .

ABOUT THE ARTIST Philip Pearlstein has had more than 100 solo shows in his career, and his work appears in The Metropolitan Museum of Art, in New York City; The Museum of Modern Art, in New York City; the Smithsonian American Art Museum, in Washington, DC; The Art Institute of Chicago; the Whitney Museum of American Art, in New York City; the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; and dozens of other major public collections. Pearlstein’s many awards include a National Endowment for the Arts scholarship, a John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation fellowship and a Fulbright fellowship. To learn more, visit philippearlstein.com or the website of Betty Cuningham Gallery at bettycuninghamgallery.com.

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RIGHT

Two Models With Recliner and Lion 1991, graphite, 23 x 29. BELOW RIGHT

Model With Gargoyle, Lion and Mirror undated (1990s), graphite, 30 x 40.



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F U N D A M E N T A L S O F P R O P O R T I O N

Measuring the Figure Using this easy technique, you can measure key proportions in the early stages of drawing and be sure you have an accurate foundation from which to work. by J O N

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D E M A RT I N


I

n order to appear lifelike, a figure drawing needs to accurately represent the proportions of the model. And in order to represent the figure in correct proportion, we need sound measurement strategies that will allow us to check what we’ve drawn for accuracy. Such basic measurements are not difficult to make, and in this article, we will look at a simple technique that allows you to verify that the most important proportions of your figure drawing are correct. By checking your drawing with this technique early in the process, you can then continue to work with confidence that your drawing truthfully captures the most important proportions of the figure.

OPPOSITE PAGE

ILLUSTRATION 1

The Proportions of the Human Body According to Vitruvius (The Vitruvian Man) by Leonardo da Vinci, pen-and-brownink, brush-andbrown-wash and metalpoint, 13½ x 9 5 ⁄ 8 . Collection Gallerie dell’Accademia, Venice, Italy. In addition to applying basic proportional measurements, it is important to have some knowledge of classical proportions—a topic Leonardo investigated in his famous drawing. Knowledge of classical proportions helps you avoid serious distortions, and because nobody exactly matches the classical ideal, it also allows you to appreciate the differences that make each body unique.

RIGHT

ILLUSTRATION 2

Young Man in Profile Holding a Ball by Charles Bargue, ca. 1826–1883, lithograph, 24 x 18.


STARTING OUT: SETTING THE EXTREMITIES OF THE FIGURE One of the first things the figure artist must consider is the size and placement of the subject on the page. Remember that it is vital to compose your figure in relation to the overall page and not make the figure so small that it “floats” against the background. Inversely, the figure shouldn’t be so large that it goes beyond the limits of the page or touches the top or bottom of the sheet, creating uncomfortable tangents. In classical academic life drawing, on a typical 18"-x-24" page, it’s advisable to fit the figure approximately ½" to 1" from the top and bottom of the page. See Illustration 2 for a typical academic life-drawing format. Working large in this way not only fills the page compositionally but also allows you to see proportional relationships more easily. Good proportion is based on division; bad proportion is based on addition and subtraction. In other words, we first need to establish the outer dimensions of our subject and keep this size unchangeable. Then, we can consider the correct division of the parts within the whole. When an artist adds to or subtracts from the outer dimensions of the subject in an attempt to repair incorrect proportions, the drawing can fall into a continual state of flux with proportions spiraling out of control and figures that don’t even fit on the page. But with a little discipline, you can avoid this. The first marks you make should indicate the extremities of your

subject’s longest dimension. For a standing figure, these marks should define the uppermost and lowermost points of the figure. (See Illustration 3b, with horizontal marks indicating the figure’s extremities.) Throughout the rest of your drawing process, do not alter or deviate from these marks. By keeping them sacred, you create a definite baseline against which incorrect proportions can be adjusted and corrected. If you were to “fix” proportional inaccuracies by adjusting


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the overall height of the figure, you would soon find that your correction in one area threw everything else out of whack, leading to adjustment after adjustment as you attempt to solve more and more problems.

3B

THE BODY’S LANDMARK POINTS

ILLUSTRATIONS 3A AND 3B

After marking the extremities of your drawing, find the action both inside and outside using light and breezy lines that relate to the figure’s most important projections (usually boney landmarks). Remember that the head is a crucial shape that can telegraph good proportion (or bad). It should be drawn at the outset. Lightly indicate the surface centers (median lines) of the head, rib cage and pelvis; these lengths are the basis of good proportion.

3A

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Before we discuss strategies for measuring the figure, I should emphasize that it is important to first draw by eye so that you can use your estimated drawing as a basis of comparison. The measurement strategies described here should be employed after you have made an initial line drawing, such as the one in Illustration 3b. As you study the principle lines of the figure, you will notice that they invariably relate to the boney landmarks of the skeleton. This brings up an important point: It is the skeletal frame that determines proportion, not the muscles. The boney landmarks are the nails upon which the body’s whole structure depends for solidity. To determine the proportions of the figure, we will look for major points of the skeleton that can serve as landmarks on any model. When measuring the figure I find it easiest to focus on just two very significant proportional landmarks. On the front of a figure, these two internal landmarks are the bottom of the chin and the pubis. (See Illustration 4a.) The chin is vital because it gives us a correct head proportion, which will give scale to our drawing. The pubis, or groin, meanwhile functions to establish the base of the torso, which varies on each person. Once we’ve found these two landmarks, the body’s other parts will fall into place. It is similar to the importance


of locating the tear duct when drawing the head—after you’ve correctly located the tear duct, all other facial features can be found in relation to it. On the back view of the figure, I use the base of the skull as the first landmark, if it is visible. If not, I instead look for the 7 th cervical vertebra, which generally protrudes prominently near the bottom of the neck. The second landmark on the back of the figure is the coccyx , or tailbone, at the base of the torso. (See Illustration 4b.) Whether the pose is foreshortened or not, these landmarks are the basis for good figure proportion. Once you have completed your initial line drawing, to ensure your drawing has correct proportions, measure whether these two landmarks are correct. If they are, you can move on to placing


Bottom of chin

Base of skull 7th cervical vertebra

Coccyx Pubis

4A

4B


To check your initial proportions on a frontal view of the figure, locate the chin and the pubis. For a back view, locate the base of the skull (or if it is not visible, use the 7th cervical vertebra, located at the base of the neck) and the coccyx, at the base of the torso.



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5

ILLUSTRATION 5

Remember to keep both your measuring stick and your drawing surface vertical when evaluating your proportions.

and refining smaller forms within the figure. If you find that these landmarks are incorrectly placed, adjust them, and then re-measure. Once they are correct, you can move on to other parts of the drawing, knowing that your figure’s foundation is accurate.

MEASURING THE INTERNAL LANDMARKS There are a variety of ways to determine whether you have accurately placed landmark points on your drawing. Some artists use comparative measuring, sometimes called counting heads—seeing how many head lengths fit into the overall figure and comparing the length of various parts to the length of the head. Personally, I find this method tedious and inaccurate because the head doesn’t always align itself to a convenient landmark. I prefer the technique of optical reduction , introduced to me by my teacher Michael Aviano. This is an ingenious, empirical method for locating the figure’s

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proportional landmarks, which requires only a measuring stick, such as a knitting needle. One advantage of optical reduction is that you don’t have to fully extend your arm, which eliminates a common source of error. (Comparative measuring, in contrast, can only be done with the arm fully extended.) However, when using optical reduction, your measuring stick must remain vertical and parallel to the picture plane, as shown in Illustration 5. Your drawing paper must also be vertical. To find a landmark in the figure:

One advantage of optical reduction is that you don’t have to fully extend your arm, which eliminates a common source of error. Dra win gMa gaz ine .co m

hold your measuring stick so that t he top of the stick aligns with t he top of the model’s head, while your t humbnail aligns with the bottommost point on the figure. (See Illustration 6.) Holding the stick as still as possible, place your free thumbnail at the landmark you wish to capture— in this case, the bottom of the chin. (See Illustration 7a.) Keeping your fingers at the same points on the stick, hold it in front of your drawing. By moving the stick forward or back, align the top of the stick and your bottom thumbnail with the top and bottom of your drawing. Make sure both the stick and your drawing surface are absolutely vertical. Then, check the location of the chin in your drawing. If it is located at the same point as your upper thumbnail, the chin is correctly placed. If your drawing does not match your thumbnail, adjust the drawing as necessary, and then re-measure. To find the pubis, repeat the operation,

6

BELOW LEFT

7A

ILLUSTRATION 6

To check proportion, hold your measuring stick so that the top of the stick aligns with the top point on the model and your thumbnail aligns with the lowest point on the model.

LEFT


To check whether you have drawn the model’s chin in its correct position, “point off” the model’s chin with your free thumbnail. Hold your thumbnails in place, align the needle with your drawing, and compare your upper thumbnail (the chin’s location on the model) to the chin’s location on your drawing. In this demonstration, the measurement shows that the chin in the drawing is located in the correct spot.

7B

If you’re interested in learning more about the fundamentals of realistic drawing, we recommend the book Drawing Atelier: The Figure, by Jon

deMartin. It covers subjects including how to construct basic shapes, how to capture the gesture of a figure and how to draw specific body parts and facial features. For more information and to purchase a copy, visit northlightshop.com/ drawing-atelier-the figure.



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8A

8B

Use the same technique of “pointing off” to check the location of the pubis, our second proportional landmark.

this time placing your upper thumbnail at the location of the pubis, and again comparing it to your drawing, as shown in Illustrations 8a and 8b. This measurement technique takes a little manual dexterity, but once you become adept with it, you’ll find it to be the most efficient and practical of all measuring techniques. It is, in essence, a linear proportional device: It compares the length of part of the body to that of the whole. The technique can also be used along a horizontal line—if you are drawing a reclining model, for instance. In this case, simply mark the extremities of the figure’s width, and then locate the head and pubis along a horizontal length. Optical reduction can also

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be applied specifically to the head if you’re drawing at a close enough distance. Using the same technique, you can check the location of the tear duct on your drawing, related to the top and bottom of the model’s head. (See Illustrations 9a and 9b.) Once you’re sure the tear duct is correct, it can serve as the determinant for the proportions of the head’s other features. By using optical reduction, you can rectify any proportional problems early on, which then allows you to develop your drawing with confidence that what you’ve drawn is accurate. This tool guarantees accuracy, reduces frustration and enhances creativity, all for the pr ice  of a knitting needle.


9A

10

9B


Optical reduction can also be applied to the head. Use it to check the location of the tear duct—the primary proportional landmark on the front of the head.

ILLUSTRATION 10 Samir

by Jon deMartin, 2012, black and white chalk on toned pap er, 25 x 19. Demonstration drawing at the Grand Central Academy. Each human being is unique, and when we gain the mastery of controlling the size of our drawing and of the subject’s proportional relationships, we can then tackle even more challenging poses—and the creative possibilities of drawing become endless.



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Learning Learn ing Fro From m the Masters:

Ingres’

Miraculous

Lines The French master’s graphite drawings teach us much about contour and portraiture. by

MARK G. MITCHELL

OPPOSITE PAGE

Portrait of Charles-François Mallet 5 1809, graphite, 10 9 ⁄ 16 16 x 8 ⁄ 16 . Collection The Art 16 Institute of Chicago; Chicago, Illinois.

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T H E F I G U R E : T H E B E S T O F D R AW AW I N G

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S

o that’s what Paganini looked like in his cravat and coat—curly haired, serene and assured, more than a bit of a showoff, cradling his violin and bow with his right arm, the comfortably articulated fingers of his left hand supporting the neck of the bow. It’s a small graphite drawing, less than 12 inches high. It seems to be as much about the wooden musical instrument as the virtuosic musician who holds it. But it’s also about that ample coat—the thick texture and decisive folds of it and how the material hangs over the form of the man. It’s also about those expert thumbs and fingers protruding from the cuffs of the coat. It’s about the face. The gaunt cheeks and confident eyes say everything about this performer who was like the Jimi Hendrix of classical music in his day. And in the end, it’s about the charm and authority of the total drawing, which is itself like a well-composed piece of music—an apt simile, not just because of the subject. The artist who drew the picture, Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres (1780–1867), also played the violin all his life. “I remember being fascinated with Ingres’ pictures back in college,” says Mary Sullivan, an artist and illustrator from Austin, Texas. “I don’t know why I liked him so much. It must have been that I had something deep down in me that he too had. I’m such a line person, like he was. There’s so much in his detail: the fabric, the folds in the drapes—you can even see what kind of material it is. I’ve heard

that textile historians study his drawings and paintings to learn about fabrics of t hat time.” Ingres’ paintings are a universe of their own. But his draftsmanship is what people remember about him. “The figures in his pencil portraits created out of controlled maelstroms of ethereally soft shading, vigorous darting marks and powerfully assured and sinuous repeating lines seem more forthrightly present than the sitters, not only in earlier drawings but also in the drawings of any era,” wrote Sanford Schwartz in The New York Review of Books, regarding a 2006 exhibition of Ingres’ works at the Louvre. “Ingres made sitters more physically tangible and

OPPOSITE PAGE

Portrait of Alexandre Lethiere, His Wife Rosina and Their Daughter Letizia 1815, graphite, 10 15 ⁄ 16 x 8 11 ⁄ 16 . Collection Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; Boston, Massachusetts. RIGHT

Portrait of Paganini 1819, graphite, 11 3 ⁄ 4 x 8 5 ⁄ 8 . Collection the Louvre, Paris, France.



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ABOVE

Portrait of Jacques-Louis Leblanc 1823, graphite, 18 x 14. Collection the Louvre, Paris, France. OPPOSITE PAGE

Portrait of Mrs. Vesey and Her Daughter Elizabeth Vesey, Later Lady Colthurst 3 13 1816, graphite, 11 ⁄ 4 x 8 ⁄ 16 . Collection the Fogg Art Museum at Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts.

psychologically present than they had perhaps ever been in the tradition of portraiture. He created one rounded, fully autonomous character after another ... resulting in an array of personalities who, in a flowing organic way, sum up an entire era.” hat an era it was, too. Jean-AugusteDominique Ingres was born in the tiny town of Montauban in southern France a few years before the fall of the Bourbon monarchy to the guillotines. His father worked in the “applied arts”: He was a sculptor, painter, architect, stone mason and home decorator who recognized his firstborn’s precocious talent early and began to instruct him in all matters design. It was said that Ingres could draw before he could walk. “I was raised in red chalk,” Ingres once stated. He learned by copying his father’s drawings and a collection of engravings of the work of other artists.

W

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T H E F I G U R E : T H E B E S T O F DR A W I N G

While the French Revolution was raging, Ingres attended the Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture, in Toulouse. Here he was introduced to the work of Renaissance painter Raphael, which would inspire him for the rest of his life. Art historian Arthur Millier wrote that Ingres was guided first “by the marvelous functional design of the ideal human body, and second, the linear and spatial pictorial design which Raphael perfected.” In 1797, at the age of 17, Ingres arrived in Paris to study in the studio of Jacques-Louis David (1748–1825), the neoclassical painter-in-residence of the French Revolution and then Napoleon’s art czar. The diligent teenager from a nowhere country town quickly stood out in David’s atelier of nearly 300 students. A year later he was admitted to the École des Beaux-Arts, France’s premier arts college, and in 1801 Ingres won France’s top art scholarship, the Prix de Rome. That singular achievement for someone so young raised everyone’s eyebrows, including probably those of his teacher, David. Napoleon’s wars had drained the treasury of cash, and it would be five years before Ingres could get to Rome to study with the prize money. In the meantime he was commissioned to paint a portrait of Napoleon, then the First Consul of France. Napoleon was a fan; it would be the first of several portraits Ingres would be asked to do of the leader. Ingres finally made it to Rome in 1808 and was able to stand in front of his beloved Raphaels. He lived in Italy, then run by the French, for the next 18 years. He studied, drew and painted in Rome, Naples and Florence. When the stipend dollars ran out, he supported himself and his wife with sporadic painting commissions from the state and hundreds of graphite portraits he made of the tourists, traveling dignitaries and wealthy émigrés who sought him out for his uncanny facility for capturing a likeness. He reportedly sold these sketches for 40 francs each, with his barber frequently acting as his agent. The little graphite portraits are “great works of art, catching in a miracle of talent features, poses, costumes, atmosphere and character,” wrote art historian Stephen Longstreet. “The people are real. They breathe and exist solidly on earth.” In 1824 Ingres returned to Paris to paint big pictures and teach in his own atelier. More than 100 pupils convened to learn his rigorous classical methods. Eventually new kinds of painting—including naturalism and romanticism—began to upstage the whopping allegorical history paintings that were being labored over by Ingres and many others. Editorial cartoonists poked fun at Ingres for his stubbornly backward-looking art and views. The artist’s famously thin skin for criticism and rejection only made it more fun for the press. Ingres left Paris in a huff in 1835 and returned to Italy to take over as director of the French Academy in Rome at the Villa Medici. He




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LEFT

Portrait of La Principessa Fiano 1817, graphite, 8 5 ⁄ 8 x 6 13 ⁄ 16 16 . Private collection. BELOW LEFT

Raphael and Fornarina 1825, graphite heightened with white, 7 x 5 3 ⁄ 4 . Collection the Louvre, Paris, France. OPPOSITE PAGE

Portrait of M. Taurel, Engraver 1 1819, graphite, 11 ⁄ 4 x 8. Private collection.

INGRES’ MATERIALS “So familiar to us are both the materials [graphite on smooth white paper] and the manner that we forget how extraordinary they must have seemed at the time,” wrote the late Agnes Mongan. “David had used white paper and occasionally a pointed graphite pencil, but never with such constancy, such subtlety or such harmony. Ingres’ manner of drawing was as new as the century.” First mass-produced in Germany in the early 1660s, graphite pencils weren’t exactly new in Ingres’ day. Still, “fine pencil drawing comes along rather late in art history,” notes painter Phillip Wade. “Everything from the time of Raphael was a blunter black chalk or red chalk or pastel, and the drawings seem rather broad. So technical innovations can make a difference in what things look like—just like oil painting created a whole different world from that of tempera painting.” “We talk about the richness of his darks and the luminosity of his drawing,” painter and art professor Frank Wright says. “He drew with really hard pencils, not so much soft pencils, and he drew with delicate, parallel shading. It looks like overall tone, but if you put them under magnification, you see these fine lines. I can’t figure out how someone could get such richness using such hard pencils.” Part of Ingres’ trick was to draw on coated paper. “Ordinary paper is very absorbent,” Wright says. “But if you cover it with gesso, or white tempera, and the coating dries, it completely changes the surfaces. Ingres drew on coated English Whatman’s paper, which made his graphite drawings look like silverpoint.”



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Study for the Portrait of Madame d’Haussonville

Portrait of Madame d’Haussonville

ca. 1842–1845, charcoal over graphite on thin white wove 1 1 paper, 14 ⁄ 8 x 8 ⁄ 6 . Collection the Fogg Art Museum at Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts.

3 3 ca. 1842–1845, graphite, 9 ⁄ 16 x 7 ⁄ 4 . Collection the Fogg Art Museum at Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Ingres made nearly two dozen similar studies before executing the oil portrait.

At this point, Ingres had settled on the composition and squared the sketch for transfer.

reinstilled classical and Renaissance traditions with their emphasis on drawing and revived the struggling school. In 1841 he returned to Paris, straight into the embrace of the new French court, as well as the powerful new middle class. Here was his new market for portraits and other commissions. He drew and painted and taught and hosted dinners until 1867, when he caught a cold that turned into pneumonia. He died at 86, leaving a body of work that still dazzles.

I

ngres’ drawings are “distinguished by their careful containment of form, perfect lines and subtle shadings,” says Phillip Wade, a painter and instructor from Texas. “I’ve never seen anyone who could do outlines as well as he could.” “Ingres was a miraculous technician,” adds Frank Wright, a painter and professor of art from Washington, DC. “He was one of the most remarkably assured

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draftsmen who ever lived. When he put a line on, he did it with such certainty. How did he draw with such authority? It’s one of the things you can’t teach about Ingres, but you can be aware of.” “I think the word talent comes into play here,” says Wade, who has examined Ingres’ work and studio materials in Ingres’ hometown. “His contour lines are extraordinary.” Contour, or outline, was the grammar and code for Ingres’ art. “We talk in c lasses a lot about the ‘lost and found line,’ the ‘lost and found edge’ and the ‘open form’ versus the ‘closed form,’” says Wade. “Botticelli and Ingres are thought of as ‘closed-form’ artists, they enclosed everything in line; whereas Delacroix and Rembrandt are examples of ‘open form’—their drawings explode over the edge of the contours. You can’t even find the line in some of their drawings. With Ingres, though, it’s really all about the containment of form with lost and found line.”


Study for the Portrait of Madame Moitessier 1 7 ca. 1844–1851, black crayon over red chalk, 14 ⁄ 16 x 12 ⁄ 16 . Collection Worcester Art Museum, Worcester, Massachusetts.

This portrait took Ingres 12 years to complete from the first drawing study to the final oil portrait.



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Sheet of Studies of Women for The Turkish Bath

ca. 1830, pen, brown ink and graphite on two joined sheets, 6 3 ⁄ 4 x 4 3 ⁄ 4 . Collection the Louvre, Paris, France.

“Ingres draws with a more subtle and various line than any of his contemporaries,” wrote the late Agnes Mongan, a pioneer in the study of drawings. “Shading is sometimes done with fine hatching; sometimes by smoothing with a stump, and there is an occasional discreet touch of wash. But these types of modeling are kept to a minimum. Line is supreme. With a graphite line that is constantly and finely adjusted—now narrow, now thick, pressing firmly or more swiftly—he defines contours with a remarkable range of modulations. Form is described above all by such calibrations of contour as well as by direction of a line.” Ingres often employed musical metaphors in describing his process to his students. “If I could make musicians of you all, you would thereby profit as painters,” he said. “Everything in nature is harmony; a little too much, or else too little, disturbs the scale and makes a false note. One must teach the point of singing true with the pencil or with brush quite as much as with the voice; rightness of forms is like rightness of sounds.” “He was excellent at gesture, but contour held that musicality for him,” says Wright. “Of course, Ingres stacked the deck in his favor by deliberately using a frontal light. If you have light coming from the side,

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it emphasizes the sculptural effect. But front lighting emphasizes the edges, the arabesque line that Raphael, who was Ingres’ god, involved himself so much with. Raphael did a lot with the curves of the form, the edges of the form. Raphael, Ingres and others knew when to interrupt the line, to allow the light to come in, so the line is not continuous. They let it be broken to show the saturation of the form in light, or be bolder on the other side to show the form is turned away from the light.” “To really succeed in a portrait, first of all one has to be imbued with the face one wants to paint, to ref lect on it for a long time, attentively, from all sides, and even to devote the first sitting to this,” Ingres once said. Indeed, he had a way of capturing the core personality of a sitter, and he believed that his accuracy came from careful observation. “He even captures their self-consciousness in posing,” Mongan noted. Ingres was a compulsive drawer, urging students to draw with their eyes when they could not do so with a pencil. For his painted portraits and murals, Ingres sometimes made hundreds of preparatory drawings. He seemed to find this step of the process more satisfying than actually painting the murals, which he sometimes abandoned. “The stages were: studying from life, wrenching truth from experience, squaring, enlarging, transporting onto canvas, going back, if necessary to the model for this or that detail,” wrote the late artist and historian Avigdor Arikha. “Asking the Count de Pastoret for his gloves or going back to Madame Moitessier’s left arm, drawing it life-size so as to t ranspose it directly onto canvas, going back to it again and again. This is when Ingres got bogged down. It was an over-elaborate— almost obsessive—proceeding, the aim of which was to get nearer to the truth of the matter.” The artist posed models (as opposed to his portrait subjects) in the nude, to better understand the underlying structure and thus get the folds exactly right in the garments or drapery falling over the body. He spent nine days painting one hand for his famously stunning portrait of Louise d’ Haussonville. “We are sometimes not aware that the people who are great are the people who are willing to spend more painstaking time on a piece,” says Wright. “Whereas someone less great would knock it out and be satisfied and stop, a person like Dürer or Raphael or Ingres would actually bring more humility to the task.” “Despite the fact that so many people could draw well then, his works were livelier and much more delightful to look at—spontaneous and fresh,” Wade says. “For Ingres, drawing was contour, with very simplified color and very simplified form.” A concept not lost on Degas, Matisse and Picasso— and so Ingres’ drawings influenced modern art, just as  they continue to fascinate us today.


Nude Man Full Front, His Head Facing Left, Left Arm Raised, Holding a Staff in His Left Hand

St. Remi

ca. 1842, graphite, 15 3 ⁄ 4 x 8. Collection the Louvre, Paris, France.

3 5 1844, black chalk and oil on canvas, 8 ⁄ 4 x 3 ⁄ 8 . Collection the Louvre, Paris, France.

An example of Ingres following academic tradition by first drawing the figure nude, then painting the clothed figure.

This painting served as the model for one in a series of stained-glass windows for the Saint-Ferdinand chapel and the royal chapel of Dreux.



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James II

2015, graphite, 29 x 23. Collection the artist.

A Many Sided Approach to

The Figure Dan Thompson encourages students to celebrate the complexity of learning how to represent life through drawing. by AU S T I N R . W I L L I A M S

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A

rtist and instructor Dan Thompson feels the same sort of passion for art education that he feels for the craft itself. “I believe that the art of studying art, getting proficient at the language, is a disgracefully underappreciated aspect of learning to draw and paint,” he says. “There’s an incredible richness to this language that’s not often talked about.” Thompson strives to explore this richness throughout his busy instructional schedule. He teaches topics including drawing fundamentals, painting the figure, the history of drawing materials and the relationship between sculpture and drawing. He has taught at numerous schools including the Art Students League of New York, the New York Academy of Art, Studio Incamminati, Parsons School of Design and the Janus Collaborative School of Art. “A lot of us don’t see ourselves as ‘art teachers,’” Thompson says. “Far be it from me to ordain somebody as an artist. I focus on skills, which I call the language. And it needs to be appreciated as an incredibly complex thing, not something to be covered in a semester.” His instruction reflects this philosophy, pulling from many traditions and staying conscious of the fact that certain methods work for some artists but not others. Thompson advocates what he calls a “comprehensive, holistic approach” to learning how to draw and paint, which incorporates quick sketching, measurement, anatomy and other considerations. “In any successful practice there is a level of mental engagement that needs to be stimulated—you need to feel yourself assembling something,” he says. “When you’re studying from the model, you might look for a moment at a plumb line, then focus on anatomical points. One thing leads to


another, and it does not erode the previous issue. A holistic approach keeps this in mind. It’s aware that every decision layers over a previous one and connects to the next thing through a thread of craftsmanship.” Here, Thompson pulls from his holistic approach to share a variety of strategies for beginning a figure drawing and for handling the challenging questions of proportion and measurement.

STARTING OUT:

Honesty, Design, Simplicity “Drawing a human being means having a human interaction,” Thompson says. “If you think about it, you’re making something together. And it’s important to recognize that every aspect of how you set this up has to do with that human interaction. You’re trying to know who that person is in order to create a unique vision of him

or her. It can be unique not because it’s different or clever but because it deals openly and honestly with what you have before you.” Thompson suggests that after a model assumes a pose—in essence, a design—the artist should first focus on the figure’s armature , the major lines that define the pose. “There are lines in that design that are long and strik ing,” he says. “Maybe it has to do with how the elbows line up, an unexpected angle or something else happening that is arresting.” By beginning your drawing with those major lines rather than focusing on individual parts and later connecting them, the resulting drawing will appear unified and harmonious. “Students often have a very hard time getting to the essentials of what they’re seeing,” Thompson says. “They start a drawing with a thousand things on their plate. But if you focus on the idea of something like the armature, the drawing will begin to grow and relate to itself. It becomes

Dan Thompson conducting a demonstration at the Art Students League of New York.


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proportionally harmonious and moves the practitioner to the next phase of the visual dialogue.” As a drawing gets underway, an artist can seize on specific parts of the design that are intriguing and beautiful. “Things catch your eye and take on some kind of significance to how you put together an image,” Thompson says. “Maybe your sitter leans back and her head is amazing. Or maybe you lift your eye level and something grabs you. Think about how what you see can be conveyed in a subtle manner—a poetic interpretation of what’s going on. Therein lies design.” Thompson recommends striving for simplicity throughout the drawing process. “Cut to the chase of what it is that you’re seeing,” he says. “It can appear very vital and alive through very little means.” He notes that when drawing a quick pose, an artist’s instinct is often to put a lot of marks on the paper, as if to make up for the short duration of the drawing. “Early on, those multiple statements may look dynamic, but there comes a time when it stops working because there are just too many statements,” he says. “From the beginning, you need to decide what you’re getting at.”

10 DIRECTIVES ON PROPORTION To help artists through the figuredrawing process, Thompson has developed 10 recommendations relating to proportion and measurement.

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them in mind. “Each line is a harmonic indicator,” Thompson continues. “If I can get those to extend, the drawing will start to draw itself. It’s not just a case of adding more things. Rather, it’s a way of dealing with what’s already there in a deeper, more appreciative manner.”

2. Fixed and Variable Coordinates

These aren’t new concepts, nor are they entirely distinct from one another, but together they form a program that can help anyone drawing from the model.

1. Linear Extension “The lines that begin a drawing are simple, fundamental and straight,” Thompson says. “Those key lines not only can be seen for the space they occupy but also can extend and pass into other regions of the design.” For example, if the line running along the tops of a model’s shoulders is one of the dynamic action lines of the pose, the artist can extend that line beyond the shoulders and use it as an important axis in the drawing. Artists can either lightly draw these lines in or simply imagine them extending into space and compose the drawing with


Sometimes during a drawing parts of the body become so large that the figure’s feet or head do not fit on t he page. One remedy for this is to fix certain spots at the beginning of the drawing process—such as placing the top of the head at the top of the page and the bottom of the feet at the bottom of the page. Do not allow yourself to deviate from these fixed coordinates. Other points remain variable, leaving the artist creative room to draw and interpret the pose. “I show my students drawings, mostly standing poses, with the head at the top of the paper and the feet at the bottom, with not even a millimeter of wiggle room,” Thompson says. “You can see this in the great Art Students League drawings from the late 1800s. These artists were concrete in their notion of top to bottom, but they were probably quite open to the idea of width. So they could put together a convincing human that’s 4, 7½ or even 20 heads tall. This aspect of comparative measurement can be one of the great secrets of how an artist can develop into a draftsperson


who captures the entire model and doesn’t lose anything unless he or she wants to lose it.”

3. Environment “If the model is in a classroom, then behind the figure in the painter’s line of sight is a lot of stuff you probably don’t want to include in your drawing—curtains, garbage cans, thermostats,” Thompson says. “But they are valuable tools for proportioning the model—all those objects form a natural grid. Include them! Draw plumb lines from them. Use the grid surrounding the model to get a more comprehensive figure drawing. I don’t understand why more students don’t include those when drawing the figure and take them away later.”

4. Notional Space “Notional space” refers to the imagined rectangle that encloses the model. The lines of this rectangle are horizontal and vertical—they extend out from the lowest, highest, farthest left and farthest right points of the pose. This rectangle gives a valuable height-to-width comparison.

5. Draw First, Measure Second “There is a belief among some artists that measurements are to be placed before the marks representing the body are made,” Thompson says. “I’ve always felt that this is problematic; it makes one inhibited in his or her approach. It means an artist is being driven not by natural means but by adherence to a grid. “I think a measuring mark is


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ABOVE

Portrait of John Pence

Demonstration Drawing of Amy

2006, graphite, 22 x 15. Collection John Pence Gallery, San Francisco, California.

2009, graphite, 24 x 18. Private collection.


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meant to be in support of a drawing mark,” he continues. “If you draw first, then measure, you eventually may not have to measure as much. If you draw without measurement, you’ll draw naturally, and that natural way of drawing will get more refined as you grow to appreciate that the eye is the final judge.”

6. Halfway Mark Rather than concentrate on one proportional canon of heads— such as saying that a figure is 7½ heads tall—Thompson advises taking a halfway measurement on the figu re. “If I have to take a measurement, I’d much rather end up with two pieces than seven and a half pieces,” he says. “Using a halfway point also teaches about perspective. From a seated pose, you notice that from halfway, perspective is quite exaggerated. Perhaps you’ve read that a certain area or landmark is the halfway point of the body— around the pubic synthesis, for instance. But, because of perspective, the natural halfway point on your figure drawing might not be there at all.”

7. Plumb Line Plumb lines are among the most familiar measurement tools, and Thompson believes they should be used strategically, in conjunction with other strategies. “I would start a drawing not with plumb line but with other forms of inquir y, such as linear extension and environment,” Thompson says. “I strive to maintain openness in mark-making. But at some point, I’ll close that openness by running angles into

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ABOVE

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Persian Archer

Amy

2004, oil, 28 x 18 . Collection Joh. Barth & Sohn, Nuremberg, Germany.



one another.” Once those major angles are established, Thompson switches to using horizontal and vertical plumbs to help with accuracy. “There’s a whole hidden grid system to play with,” he says. An artist can choose to either draw these lines in or simply visualize them for reference. For gesture drawings, Thompson suggests you go ahead and draw them in. “That line is like an artifact that’s part of a visual notebook,” he says. “On the other hand, if you’re dealing with a long-pose drawing and developing other ideas, I wouldn’t necessarily draw the plumb lines. Imply them, use them quietly.”


8. Two-Point Measurement Two-point measurement refers to using a length between two points as a standard against which to measure other parts of a figure. One such method is assessing the body in units of head lengths. “If I take a head length and multiply it, I get into a canon of proportion,” Thompson says. “Everyone who’s studying how to draw should look at a canon and begin to draw a canon from memory to develop an understanding of the tendencies of human figures. For example, maybe you’ll learn that in a seated pose, there

are usually 4 heads from the top of the head to the bottom of the pelvis. Then, when somebody doesn’t exactly match those proportions, you know it immediately and can use that deviation from the norm to better depict the figure. The goal isn’t to force an individual into a preordained system but to notice and celebrate variation.”

9. Three-Point Measurement Three-point measurement involves identifying major and minor points and comparing triangles and angles against one another. “Triangulation is


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Zoe (preparatory drawing) 2004, graphite, 17 x 23. Collection Bay Area Classical Artist Atelier, San Carlos, California.

a good word for it,” Thompson says. “It allows you to notice immediately if something is bigger or smaller.” These triangles can be based upon the areas between the major points of a figure. “With time and experience, you can tell if a certain point is a major point or a minor point,” Thompson says. “Some points are important, others not.”

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10. Major Anatomical Landmarks Thompson advocates using anatomical knowledge in conjunction with all t he other tools in an artist’s arsenal. Among other purposes, it can help one recognize how the body positions itself in space. But Thompson warns that anatomy can involve certain st rategic limitations. “In my view, the knowledge of anatomy is best employed after looking at pure design—the abstraction, the


lines converging, the dynamism of a pose—before putting a name to a given point,” he explains. “So I hold off on using anatomical knowledge until I’m far enough along in a drawing. When you think about anatomical landmarks, it awakens all kinds of things you’re familiar with, which can become a kind of gateway into other, subtle aspects of form expect ation.”


I

n all, Thompson’s multitiered system of teaching figu re drawing is itself a valuable reminder to not become too fixated on a single method or tool. This multiplicity can be liberating. “I am fascinated with the idea that you can take a drawing system with all these things in it, apply it to an individual, and this astonishing language will enable him

or her to transcend it,” Thompson says. “Without the advantage of training, the individual is lost within the indecision of ignorance. Some instructors advocate the study of expression and ideas only. Techniques, tools and skills gel with some artists’ temperament and not with others’, but with the skills, an artist is able to focus on  things other than skil l.”

ABOUT THE ARTIST Dan Thompson’s art has received numerous awards and been exhibited throughout the world at venues including the Corcoran Gallery of Art and the United States Capitol, both in Washington, DC; the National Arts Club, in New York City; the Pasadena Museum of California Art; the Art Gallery of Ontario, in Toronto; and the Beijing World Art Museum, in China. The artist co-founded two schools of art in New York City: The Grand Central Academy of Art and the Janus Collaborative School of Art. Thompson has served on the M.F.A. faculty of the New York Academy of Art for 15 years, and he is a senior faculty member of Studio Incamminati, in Philadelphia. For more information, visit danthompsonart.com.

Ace




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Untitled 2016, charcoal, 24 x 18. All artwork this article collection the artist unless otherwise indicated.

Beauty, Balance &

Accuracy Mark Tennant’s drawings

evidence both rigorous academic standards and sensitivity to the nuances of the figure. by AU S T I N

M

R . WI L LI A MS

ark Tennant’s charcoal drawings combine academic rigor and intensity with harmony and beauty. His figures are tightly rendered in places but also somewhat ethereal, with limbs often dissolving into the vast negative space surrounding each figure. The drawings exude discipline and balance—principles that guide many aspects of Tennant’s art. Part of this discipline can be found in the fact that Tennant has practical reasons for the many beautiful and intriguing effects visible in his drawings. The limbs that fade to white, the dramatic contrasts between deep shadows and broad lights and the sketch lines left to indicate otherwise unfinished areas of the figure are present not only for their aesthetic value but also for compositional purposes. “I want to direct the eye to the beauty of the figure,” Tennant says. His desire to guide the viewer’s eye is the main reason Tennant chooses not to fully render his figures, instead leaving limbs and extremities unfinished or entirely absent. “If I’m getting to the extremity, I’m pulling the eye

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away from the action,” he says. “If I start getting into areas away from the action, I may destroy the overall effect.” Tennant notes that even the finest academic drawings can be so tightly rendered and consistently finished that they appear too complete. “You have to finish in the right place; you don’t have to go wall-to-wall on the whole thing,” he says. “All the good art is about real restraint.” Tennant quotes Joshua Reynolds’ advice: “No work can be too much finished, provided the diligence employed be directed to its proper object; but I have observed that an excessive labour in the detail has, nine times in ten, been pernicious to the general effect. ... It indicates a bad choice.” Tennant aims first to grab the viewer’s attention through the design of the piece and the pose of the model. Then, once the viewer has stopped to look at the drawing, he or she starts part icipating with the artwork by mentally connecting the dots between highlights and shadows, filling in the form and imagining the parts of the scene that have not been rendered. Another goal of Tennant’s artwork is to reveal something about the figure that viewers may be aware of


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BELOW LEFT

BELOW RIGHT

Untitled

Untitled

Untitled

2009, charcoal, 24 x 18.

2016, charcoal, 24 x 18.

2016, charcoal, 24 x 18.

but that they have never fully realized or articulated. “Through art, you can tell them what they didn’t really know that they knew,” Tennant explains. “I want viewers to think, That light is connected to that transition...which is connected to that form shadow...and it falls across the shoulder like that...I never knew that I knew that.” The artist cites John Singer Sargent as a master of this effect. “His drawings are unbelievably smashing,” Tennant says. “They’re Perfect with a capital P.”

C

reating an image captivating enough to engender such intense involvement on behalf of the viewer begins with selecting a compelling pose for the model, and Tennant often looks for effect ive poses used by other artists. “I go with poses that are tried and true, maybe with adjustment here and there,” he says. A frequent source of inspiration is contemporary artwork from Russia’s Repin Academy. “I think that’s some of the best work being done right now,” he says. “Those instructors really know what they’re doing, and those poses really work.” Tennant also looks to Prud’hon and 19th -century French academic painters for poses, and lately he has been


experimenting with a more straightforward, contemporary look. “What makes the figure beautiful is balance,” he says. “When one muscle contracts, another expands. When one side is curved, the other side is straight to support it. That’s what I’m looking for in these poses. I’m looking for that rhythm that flows from the model stand all the way through the head.” The artist begins drawing with a preliminary diagram to help determine balance, proportion and placement; he compares this sketch to a recipe or a set of blueprints. He often draws it in a corner of the paper that he will use for the finished drawing, and he sometimes doesn’t erase it. He does this to leave a trace of his process, although sometimes the sketch remains simply because “I forget to take it off.” These initial sketches, as well as all the initial lines outlining the figure, are drawn with Tennant’s hardest, lightest charcoal pencil—a General’s HB (or an extra-hard 2H). Later in the process he switches to a softer charcoal pencil (General’s 2B) and willow charcoal from Winsor & Newton or Coates. Tennant draws on 18"-x-24" sheets of 70-lb white drawing paper, often Utrecht or Strathmore.


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LEFT

Untitled 2009, charcoal, 24 x 18. BELOW

Untitled

2009, charcoal, 24 x 18.

“I sharpen the pencils to needle-sharp points,” Tennant explains, “then I hold them with thumb and forefinger and draw with my entire arm, not just with my fingers and wrists. You need to sit well back. All your measurements should be made with arm’s-length extension so that every time you make a sight measurement, the pencil is the same distance from your eye.” He carefully measures shapes by comparing height and width proportions and using every bit of information he can get for points of comparison, including plumb points and level points, as well as fixed points on furniture. “You can’t measure too much,” he says, “and all the measurements that you make support the expressiveness in the modeling.” Head size is key, and he closely adheres to a 7½-head academic proportion. “It needs to be done in a precise and accurate manner,” he says. “There’s no ‘good enough’ or ‘that’ll do.’ If you do this, and all your combinations agree, the drawing can’t help but be accurate.” A

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finished drawing will often show light lines from these measurements in place of arms, legs or furniture that have not been rendered. “Underneath the drawing, the construction lines are there,” he says. “I don’t want it all to disappear.” The artist favors a light source that is above, in front and to the side of the model. “The sun is above our heads,” he says, “we respond to things lit f rom above. I exaggerate it for the drama and the effects it creates.” Such lighting allows Tennant to draw deep, delicately rendered shadows. “I spend a great deal of time drawing the shadow shapes—as much time as I do searching for anatomical landmarks,” he says. “A lot of people just want to start massing in a dark shape, but I find it’s important to construct the light source in the shadow.” Once he has measured all the shadow shapes and outlined them in hard charcoal, Tennant masses them in with willow charcoal in a medium or dark value. “Willow


is very soft and forgiving, like a powder,” he says. “By massing that in, you can tell pretty quickly if the light is convincing. I take off the excess with the back of my hand, and then I work back into it using the 2B pencil. Then, if I took too much off, I go back in with the willow.” Throughout the process, Tennant stresses that careful planning is essential. “It’s three minutes of thinking and one minute of drawing—or five minutes of thinking and 30 seconds of drawing,” he says. “The pencils and brush don’t have to be moving the whole time. It doesn’t mean you’re not working if you’re sitting there and studying.” Although Tennant advocates the use of precise measurement, he warns against rigidity in the drawing process and cautions that artists need to know when to break free of academic procedure. “There needs to be a balance,” he says. “If the process is too mechanical, the drawing is going to be that way. You need the structure in order to support the artistry, but you have to know when it’s time to cut loose a bit. The drawing can’t say, ‘See how well I can draw.’ It has to reach for something.”

T

ennant takes inspiration from artists throughout history, but he particularly admires 19th-century French artists whose artwork seems both traditional and modern. “I love Manet and his teacher, Thomas Couture,” Tennant says. “Their drawing is reminiscent of the Old Masters. It’s just gorgeous, but t here’s something about it that’s not the dry academy. It’s 19th -century, but it rises above the 19th century and leads us where we are today.” Tennant also holds Théodule Ribot, Hans Makart and Carolus-Duran (the teacher of Sargent) in high regard, and he has especially high praise for Jean-Jacques Henner. “His art is very soft, with beautiful color,” Tennant says. “It has a dreamlike quality.” As for more contemporary artists, Tennant describes Deane Keller as “one of the most important people that I’ve ever encountered.” He also admires the artwork of Edward Schmidt, Steven Assael and Alex Kanevsky. After more than 30 years as an instructor, Tennant is full of valuable advice for draftsmen working to hone their craft. He advocates hard work and building a connection with the Old Masters, principles which have led him to teach courses on copying at museums. “There’s nothing like it,” he says. “To stand in front of a Rubens or Van Dyck and spend hours in silent conversation with these pieces will broaden you like no other experience. You come away almost like a changed person.” In the French academic tradition, Tennant notes, students’ first paintings are copies. “Next to figure drawing, copying is the core of the curriculum, but it’s been overlooked of late.” “It’s not about making a reproduction,” he continues. “It’s about making a copy —trying to look through


Untitled 2009, charcoal, 24 x 18.

the years of varnish on there and track the stages of the painting from the construction to the grisaille and finally developing the color. Your copy is just a copy, but then when you paint, you know that you have walked in the footsteps of a master. What it does for the students’ conf idence is amazing.” The practice has rich historical precedent; Tennant cites Veronese’s The Marriage at Cana as one pinnacle of human and artistic production that has been copied for centuries. Tennant has also looked through copyist records at the Louvre and discovered handwritten names of great artists who registered as copyists, such as an “H. Matisse” who signed up to copy a Chardin in 1893. Nothing, however, can take the place of hard work. “Like anything else, you have to work, you have to


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Untitled 2016, charcoal, 18 x 24.

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practice,” Tennant says. “We say that it’s work, but it’s fun. You have to love it, though, and you have to do it every day. There’s no such thing as drawing too much. You need to study the proportion charts and realize that when you draw, you’re constructing, not imitating. You’re building the figure the way a carpenter builds a house. And you need to keep your tools in perfect condition.” Through it all, Tennant emphasizes the need for balance in art and work. “It goes back to balance—that harmony between warm and cool, thick and thin,” he says. “Straight lines and curved lines complement one another. A straight line will make a curved line more beautiful, and vice versa. I keep finding that it’s all about having control over yourself and finding that balance in your art and life. And of course, my art is my life. The bal ance exists throughout.”

ABOUT THE ARTIST Mark Tennant

received a B.F.A. from the Maryland Institute College of Art, in Baltimore, and an M.F.A. from the New York Academy of Art, in New York City. For the years 2008 and 2009 he was the director of graduate fine art painting at Academy of Art University, in San Francisco, where he had been an instructor since 1998. Among other exhibitions, his paintings have twice been displayed in the Salon d’Automne, in Paris. He has taught museum copying at the Louvre, in Paris; The Metropolitan Museum of New York, in New York City; and the Legion of Honor, in San Francisco. For more information, visit marktennantart.com.



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12 Anatomical Differences Between Men and Women The differences between male and female bodies range from the obvious to the very subtle, and knowledge of these details can lead us to more informed, realistic figure drawings. Vive la différence! by

LARRY WITHERS

L

earning to draw and paint anatomi- Many are related to a woman’s ability to procreate—the cally accurate figures can be the work ability to carry, give birth to and nurture a child are of a lifetime. Specifically, depicting reflected in the female body’s outward appearance. the finer differences between male and female figures Every person is unique, and plenty of individuals differ is a challenge even for the greatest artists—as much as from the “norms” presented here. But on the whole, I admire the figures of Michelangelo, his work is prima these principles hold true for the majority of figures, and facie evidence that breasts and genitalia alone do not knowing these attributes can help you draw from life or make a male or female figure. These are the most obvious from imagination with greater confidence and accuracy. physical attributes that distinguish the sexes, but they’re Before we begin, a note regarding proportion: When comnot the only ones. The characteristics that distinguish paring bodies, we must take into account the size difference women and men are many and subtle; an inch here, between men and women. In some cases the difference a curve there. But the cumulative effect is unmistak- between male and female is merely a factor of males being able—it’s why we can often distinguish a man from a on average larger. For instance, the width of the male skelwoman a block away, even if they are identically dressed. eton at the shoulders is greater than that of the female skelIn this article we’ll address 12 characeton, but this is simply because the male skeleThe Fall and Expulsion teristics that help to identify a person’s From the Garden of Eden ton is generally larger overall—the proportions sex. These physical differences have to by Michelangelo Buonarroti, are the same. Here, we’ll be looking at cases in 1509–1510, fresco, 110¼ x do with proportions, muscle definition, which the difference between male and female 224½. Collection Vatican bone structure, fat deposits, and so on. is not simply a factor of the body’s overall size. Museums, Vatican City.

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Adam and Eve

by Jan Gossaert, 1507–1508, oil on panel, 22¼ x 14½. Collection Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, Spain.

A B

1

HIP DIMENSIONS The general profiles of men and women are different—often strikingly so. Male bodies tend to be broad at the shoulders (A) and taper as they descend to the hips. With women, it’s the opposite (B). In fact, male and female pelvises are different in all dimensions. A woman’s hips are wider, not as high, and shallower from front to back. The configuration of the hips affects many surface forms of the torso. Take Poupart’s ligament, for example. This important long fibrous tissue is attached to the pelvis and marks the point where the torso ends and the thigh begins. Since the female hips are lower and wider, the slope of this ligament is flatter on a female body than on a male.

D

E

C Female hips are wider than male hips, as shown by Measurement C. Male hips, however, are deeper, as shown by Measurement D.

The angle of Poupart’s ligament (E) is more vertical on males and more horizontal on females.



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FEMALE

The slightest tilt of the pelvis (A) sets off a string of compensatory movements that affects the female form’s whole posture.

2

PELVIC TILT The difference in pelvic tilt between men and women is one of those characteristics that has a lot to do with procreation. The male pelvis is relatively vertical, whereas the female pelvis has a notable forward tilt (A), which helps a woman carry the weight of a child. Women’s pelvic tilt produces a forward shift of weight. To compensate for this, a woman’s thorax, or chest, tilts backward (B). As a result of these two tilts, the lumbar region of a woman’s spine has a pronounced curve (C). The tailbone also rises, making the posterior hike up (D), which opens up the angle between the rib cage and the hipbones (E).

B

E

C

D

A

MALE

Venus Binding Her Hair (detail) by John William Godward, 1897, oil, 895 ⁄ 8 x 44 5 ⁄ 8 . Private collection. In this painting Godward illustrates the sweeping lumbar curve of the female lower back, mirrored by the abdominal curve in the front.

FEMALE

3

RIB CAGE Proportionally, male and female rib cages are not too different, with one exception. A female’s rib cage is shorter, giving it a more rounded appearance when seen from the front. In turn, a male’s sternum, or breastbone, is proportionally longer than a female’s. When seen from the side, the sternum has a bend in it, which can be quite noticeable in the male, giving

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MALE

the chest the appearance of jutting forward. This angle is not so pronounced on a female sternum, making a female chest appear comparatively shallow. Finally, the floating ribs (the two lowest ribs, which do not attach to the sternum) are smaller on females, leaving the female body with more room for childbearing.


4

CARRYING ANGLE

Woman Carrying Firewood and a Pail

When humans stand erect, palms facing forward, the lower arm flairs away from the body. This is referred to as the carrying angle. This anatomical feature permits humans to carry objects, say a pail of water, without banging into our hips. The precise angle depends largely on the width of the hips. Because a man’s hips are proportionally narrower, a man’s carrying angle is generally smaller than a woman’s.

by Jean-Francois Millet, ca. 1858–1860, oil on panel, 15½ x 11¾. Private collection.

The angle of the condyle of the humerus dictates the carrying angle.

15 °


20 °


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MALE

5

WAIST LENGTH We noted previously that the female pelvic region is proportionally wider and not as high as the male and also that the female rib cage is shorter than the male. Taken together, these differences mean that the distance between the bottom of the rib cage and the top of the hips is greater in females, so the female waist is more elongated. While we’re discussing the region of the waist, let’s address the abdominal muscles, the stomach muscles that originate at the pubic bone and insert at the 5th, 6th and 7th ribs. As the pelvis and the rib cage are configured differently between the sexes, the abdominals are configured differently as well.

FEMALE The difference in the amount of space between the bottom of the ribs and the iliac crest at the top of the hips accounts for the shorter waist in men and the longer waist in women.

Grande Odalisque by Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres, 1814, oil on canvas, 35 x 64. Collection the Louvre, Paris, France. Ingres’ painting depicts a woman whose back has no end . Ingres was constantly in s earch of ideal in the human form, and he was willing to bend the laws of anatomy to find it. His handling of this figure is reminiscent of 16 th-century Mannerist painters, who often contorted and elongated parts of the body to expressive ends.

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Princesse de Broglie (detail) by Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres, 1851–1853, oil, 47¾ x 35¾. Collection The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City. The downward-angled clavicles give the effect of rounded shoulders.

DISTINCTIVE “S” CURVE

6

THE CLAVICLE The clavicle, or collarbone, is the only horizontal bone in the body, and it acts like a strut on the wing of an airplane to keep the shoulder blade in place. Seen from the front the bone looks straight. Seen from above it exhibits a slight S-shaped curve. It’s a great landmark for artists because it can be seen just under the skin for its entire length. There are distinct variations in the clavicles of men and women—so much so that forensic experts use it to determine gender when examining skeletal remains. In men, the clavicles are thick, rough and stout, with pronounced curves. From a frontal view, the bones appear relatively level or even angle up as they move out to where they articulate with the shoulder blade. In women, the clavicles are slenderer, smoother and have shallower curves. In a frontal view, the female clavicles are either level or angled slightly downward.

MALE


FEMALE

On average, male clavicles are angled higher than female clavicles as the bones move from the neck out to the shoulders.


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7

FAT DEPOSITS A certain amount of body fat, also called adipose tissue, is essential to human life. In fact, the entire body is covered with a layer of subcutaneous fat. Fat insulates and regulates body temperature, provides energy stores and protects and enhances body contouring. The typical man has less fat, as a percentage of his overall mass, than does the typical woman. Authorities differ regarding the precise amounts of fat common to male and female bodies but generally list men as averaging 4% to 6% less fat. Furthermore, fat is distributed differently on men and women. With men, fat tends to collect around the belly. With women, it gathers on the thighs, hips, and buttocks. These areas of fat further heighten the physical differences in the sexes. For instance, the flanks, the area on the sides of the spinal column between the ribs and hips, is markedly different in men and women. With men, this area is lean, revealing more the outline of the hipbones and the surrounding muscles. On women, the hips are more often obscured by fat tissue, creating a gradual slope from the waist to the buttock. Another example: The widest part of the male figure (disregarding the arms) is located at the greater trochanter, a projection of the femur, or thigh bone. As a result of fat deposits, the widest part of the female f igure is just below the greater trochanter.

8

Typical fat deposits on male and female figures. On males, fat is more concentrated in the belly, whereas on women, fat is more concentrated in the thighs and hips.

TENDON

MUSCLE MASS Men on average have more muscle fibers and muscle mass, so they appear more muscular. This difference is amplified by the fact that women have more fatty tissue, which obscures the contours of muscles.

MUSCLE FIBER

BONE

Samson and Delilah

by Anthony van Dyck, 1628–1630, oil, 58¼ x 1013 ⁄ 16 . Collection Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna, Austria.

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MALE

FEMALE

9

ARM AND LEG LENGTH There is considerable variance among the length of individuals’ arms and legs, but on average, men have proportionally longer arms and legs than women. This can be an advantage for women, whose shorter legs give them a lower center of gravity, making it easier to carry heavy objects, such as a child in the womb. This also means that the midway point on the figure’s height seems to be slightly higher on the female body. Men have longer arms, as well. With arms hanging at his side, a man’s elbow falls somewhere between the rib cage and the hips. A woman’s elbow generally falls higher, nearer the rib cage.

Leg length is generally the greatest determining factor of a person’s height relative to other members of his or her sex.

Adam and Eve 1 by Harald Slott-Möller, 1891, oil on panel, 30¼ x 31 ⁄ 8 . Collection Statens Museum, Copenhagen, Denmark.

A woman’s legs are proportionally shorter than a man’s, giving women greater stability.



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10

ADAM’S APPLE

The columnar shape of the trachea helps to fill out the rounded anterior shape of the neck. The purpose of the thyroid, among thyroid, among other th things, is to help regulate body temperature and metab metabolism.

LEFT

The Creation of Adam (detail)

ADAM’S APPLE

by Michelangelo Buonarroti, ca. 1510–1512, fresco, 225 x 110. Collection Vatican Museums, Vatican City.

THYROID GLAND

BELOW LEFT

The Birth of Venus (detail)

The trachea, or windpipe, is a tube through which air is drawn into and expelled from the lungs. The windpipe is protected by a hard outer shell made of several pieces of cartilage, the thyroid cartilage being the largest. The thyroid cartilage is notable for a large projection just under the skin called the laryngeal prominence, or, more commonly, the Adam’s apple. The Adam’s apple is a larger, more dominant feature in men. Just below the Adam’s apple is the thyroid gland, which helps to control the body’s rate of metabolism. The presence of the thyroid fills out the shape of the neck. It was once thought that the female thyroid was larger than the male, but current opinion holds that the female thyroid only looks larger, because the female Adam’s apple is so small that the thyroid looks large in comparison.

11

There’s a marked difference in form between Michelangelo and Botticelli. In Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel fresco, the original Adam’s apple is quite evident. Botticelli, in contrast, eschews all muscle definition in the neck of Venus.

HANDS AND FEET

The Fall of Man by Cornelisz van Haarlem, 1592, oil, 107½ x 86 5 ⁄ 8 . Collection Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, the Netherlands.

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by Sandro Botticelli, 1483–1485, tempera on canvas, 677 ⁄ 8 x 109 5 ⁄ 8 . Collection Uffizi Gallery, Florence, Italy.


Women’s hands are, on average, proportionally smaller and slenderer than men’s. The male foot is proportionally larger than the female foot. It’s interesting to note that men’s index fingers are generally shorter than their fourth fingers, whereas women’s index fingers are generally longer than their fourth fingers.

MALE

FEMALE


12

The Arnolfini Portrait

by Jan van Eyck, 1434, oil on oak, 32 3 ⁄ 8 x 23 5 ⁄ 8 . Collection National Gallery, London, United Kingdom.

THE SKULL The skulls of young boys and girls are quite similar, but as they age, differences emerge. Most of these have to do with the size and angularity of the facial bones. The zygomatic, or cheek bones (A), are broader and more pronounced on males. The same can be said for the mandible, or jawbone (B). The male supraorbital ridge, or brow ridge (C), just above the eye socket, enlarges and advances, creating a visor-like prominence. It also gives the male forehead a sloped-back appearance, whereas the female forehead is more vertical. The male eye socket (D) is squarish, as is the angle of the jaw. The female skull, in contrast, exhibits a more rounded appearance in both these areas.

C D A

B

C D A

Male skulls are generally broader and more angular than female skulls.

B

W

e should conclude by again noting that these differences between men and women are not absolute. No two bodies are alike, and in many cases not all of the attributes outlined here hold true. But on average, they do, and together this conglomeration of attributes allows us to visually distinguish between men and women. This knowledge can be put to use when drawing, either as a guide to drawing an “ideal” figure or as a standard to measure our individual figures against, allowing us to  further appreciate the unique appearance of every person.



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Making Lines move The drawings of Fred Hatt are as much performances as objects. by J O H N

A . PA R K S

I

n a series of enormous drawings on black paper, Fred Hatt presents a swiftly moving rhythmic line in a multitude of vibrant colors. From a shifting mesh of shapes and movements emerges images of nudes dancing, romping, posing and resting. At certain points the line has been enhanced by suggestions of tonal development, perhaps the inclusion of a highlight or a small area of color clinging to a shape to intimate the solid forms of the human body. But for the most part the line is left alone to move with its own raw power, projecting a sense of joyous energy as it surges through the work. Incredibly, given their scale, these drawings are developed from life in front of a model. “I work on the floor, crawling over a large sheet of paper and covering it with overlapping sketches of movement or quick poses ta ken by a model-collaborator,” says the artist. “Once the drawing reaches a specific density, like a tangle of threads, I begin to work on carving a structure out of this undifferentiated energy field. I bring some of the layers of drawing forward by adding depth and weight to the forms, and I push other layers into the background or into abstraction. I alternate between crawling on the drawing, where individual lines can be followed like paths, and standing back to get a sense of overall form and balance.” Hatt generally uses Caran d’Ache aquarelle crayons occasionally augmented by oil pastels to do these pieces. He purchases black or gray charcoal paper in large rolls, although he has sometimes worked on black gessoed canvas. The drawings are generally exhibited attached to the wall with large paper clamps.

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Mesh

2005, aquarelle crayon, 60 x 60. All artwork this article collection the artist.


K T : � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � P



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OPPOSITE PAGE, ABOVE LEFT

Tomasso 1 3 2 x 19 ⁄ 4 . 2009, aquarelle crayon, 27 ⁄

OPPOSITE PAGE, ABOVE RIGHT

Theresa 1 3 2 x 19 ⁄ 4 . 2008, aquarelle crayon, 27 ⁄

OPPOSITE PAGE, BELOW

Active Mirror Location photograph.

RIGHT

Double Exposure Stretch 2006, aquarelle crayon, 30 x 30.

An intense physical involvement, both with the drawing and the sense of situation developed with the model, is at the heart of Hatt’s work. He sees art as central to life, as a dynamic force that can involve itself in all aspects of being. “In premodern cultures there are no firm boundaries dividing art from magic and religion or from everyday life,” he says. “Visual artists make masks and paint drums and bodies for ceremonies and festivals. In our time everyday life, religion, philosophy, science and the arts have all been made into clearly separate fields of endeavor, and the arts have been further separated into discrete disciplines. Even beyond that, high art has been separated from popular culture and separated from the average people behind walls of elitist intimidation. From my point of view these developments are not positive for humanity or creativity, so I choose to strive, in my own creative life, to reintegrate everything in any way I can.” The artist believes that drawing is uniquely suited to this enterprise of giving art a much broader role in our culture. “To me, drawing is more interesting than painting because a drawing retains the gestures of its making, whereas in a painting things tend to get blended and ‘finished,’” says Hatt. “Gestural markings are the core of drawing, and in this sense drawing is similar to dance or music, as it depends on the artist maintaining a focused form of movement for a designated period of time. It’s not a long step from having this understanding of the work to finding ways of presenting drawing or painting as a performing art.” Rather than producing an independent, aesthetically pleasing object suitable for framing and placement on a


gallery wall, Hatt tends to see his pieces as part of a web of movement and performance undertaken by models, dancers and other performers in conjunction with a visua l artist. On many occasions he has made a piece that is entirely bound up with a performance. “In one piece, the Active Mirror, I stood inside a Midtown Manhattan storefront window owned by the arts organization Chashama,” recalls the artist. “Whenever someone would stop on the sidewalk outside the window, I would draw a quick sketch of that person on the inside of the glass. Over a period of hours, the window became covered with images of the diversity of Manhattan street life. Thus the act of drawing became a direct way of relating to strangers through seeing them and responding to them without words.” The piece was a big success and furthered the artist’s desire to integrate art more widely into life. “People loved it,” says Hatt, “and the audience was far broader than it would have been for anything that people would have needed to come inside for, even if it were free and heavily advertised.” Hatt has also undertaken performance pieces in more theatrical environments, including involving


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OPPOSITE PAGE

Verso

2008, aquarelle crayon, 60 x 48. RIGHT

Leah 1 3 2008, aquarelle crayon, 27 ⁄ 2 x 19 ⁄ 4.

BELOW

Tram 1 3 2008, aquarelle crayon, 27 ⁄ 2 x 19 ⁄ 4.

himself with performers of butoh, a form of Japanese dance. In a piece titled Shadows, which Hatt staged with the dancer Corinna Brown as part of a butoh program, the dance was performed as a shadow play on a big white screen. “As part of the performance, I painted with ink on the screen, tracing the shadow of the dancer behind the screen, producing an abstract painting of calligraphic, swooping lines in response to the dancer’s movements,” says Hatt. Hatt’s studies reflect his interest in the ephemeral nature of the human body. “Most figurative artists study the anatomical structure of bones and muscles,” says the artist. “I felt that I wanted to portray the body not only as an object or form but also as a living structure of energy in dynamic tension, so I went on to study the anatomy of movement, the networks of vessels and nerves and the patterns of chakras and meridians and auras as described by yogis and acupuncturists and healers. I was also interested in the hands-on understanding of the body as described by


practitioners of massage, shiatsu, Rolfing, Reichian therapy, et cetera. All this knowledge is relevant to seeing and understanding the body.” Hatt points out that when he is standing in front of the model his drawing is influenced by far more than the things he actually sees. “What I feel also comes into it,” he says. “When I am drawing from observation of the human form, I draw on my memories of the kinesthetic experience of my own body in stillness and in motion. Here my experience with yoga and my own time on the modeling stand informs me.” If Hatt’s work is molded by an almost transcendental sense of what it means to be human, his drawing practice


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LEFT

Anna Marie 1 3 2008, aquarelle crayon, 27 ⁄ 2 x 19 ⁄ 4.

BELOW

Jaece 1 3 2008, aquarelle crayon, 27 ⁄ 2 x 19 ⁄ 4.

OPPOSITE PAGE, BELOW

Schism

2006, ink, 24 x 36.

has developed from many years of work in front of very real models. He has spent years attending several lifedrawing sessions per week, and for years he served as the monitor of a weekly three-hour nude long-pose session at the studio of Minerva Durham, who runs the famous Spring Studio in Manhattan. “Having to attend the longpose class all the time was a challenge for me because I’m naturally attracted to quick poses, energy and movement. But I’m glad Minerva asked me to do it because it forced me to learn to sustain my attention on a drawing and really develop it. A lot of what I do at the long-pose sessions could be called nude portraits.” Hatt is particularly intrigued by these nude portraits because of the way in which the Western tradition has

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separated the genres of the portrait and the nude. “Nude portraits are hard to sell,” he says. “If someone wants a sexy nude to hang in their bedroom, they don’t want it to look like a specific individual person that they don’t know. Most people like nudes to be a bit idealized or generalized. A lot of artists who study life-drawing generalize the figures deliberately because they’re trying to learn to draw the generic ‘human figure.’ But to me the most interesting thing about the endless parade of nude models is their individuality. The amazing variety to be observed in breasts or collarbones or noses or body hair is, to me, fascinating and beautiful. And every body—male or female, young or ancient, bony or fleshy—is beautiful when you are looking with the artistic eye.” Hatt finds


that the people who most admire these drawings are the models themselves, who are delighted to find themselves appreciated for their individual qualities. “And people who like my work often commission me to do nude portraits,” he says. “I think I’ve done more nude portraits by commission than conventional portraits. Like his big performance drawings, Hatt’s work in the life room also involves color. “Someone once said an artist can be either a draftsman or a colorist but not both,” he says. “I always take this kind of dualistic statement as an artistic challenge, and so I tried to be both a draftsman and a colorist. Using crayons on dark paper allows a kind of additive color approach. If you mix two colors of paint the result is always a bit darker and duller than its sources, but as Seurat discovered, if you juxtapose small strokes of various colors, especially when those colors are brighter than their ground, the light reflected from the colors blends in the eye to make colors that may be brighter than their source colors.” Hatt finds that his approach to color is rather different in his long studies than it is in his large performance drawings. “In drawing colors from observation during a long pose, the colors of the crayons never match t he object colors I see,” he says, “but I keep looking for subtle shifts of tone. Human flesh has subtle coloration with translucent layers and many variations of tint, reflection and undertone on a single body. Studying it is like analyzing the complexity and character of a fine wine. I go over and over looking for tendencies—what areas are a little more yellowish than the rest, or where do I see a cooler cast? Where is the salmon, the olive, the cyan?” Hatt says that he is not so much interested in the accuracy of his color as he is in capturing the feeling and complexity of the subject. “I like these drawings to look very classical and realistic when seen from a distance,” he says, “but wild and loose when seen from up close.” In the big experimental drawings, however, Hatt’s color is used rather differently. “When overlapping many figures I choose colors at random but keep changing them in order to have a way of distinguishing the lines of one figure from those of another,”


he says. “In the quicker drawings the use of color is more ABOUT abstract and intuitive. I may THE choose colors for their emotional ARTIST feel or just for the quality of light or energy they suggest. And Born in Oklahoma, when working on black paper, Fred Hatt drew the bright colors can take on a and painted from an early age. He studied neon quality.” filmmaking in college, Hatt is extremely thoughtful eventually moving to when talking about his enterNew York and beginning prise as a whole. “I like to think to draw seriously. He about philosophical, physical has exhibited widely in and metaphysical questions,” mostly experimental galleries and alternative he says, “and my art is the field venues in the New York of practice where I test and City area, supporting develop my ideas. I try to work himself as a freelance in a spirit of joy, and so I hope videographer. For that the artwork carries that more information, visit fredhatt.com. spirit and communicates it to those who see it. I believe duality is an illusion, so, like an alchemist, I’m always trying to achieve a ‘conjunction of opposites,’ making work that is both classical and expressionistic, both Apollonian and Dionysian. I want to maintain a connection to the primal art of the Paleolithic painters, the craft of the Old Masters  and the playful experimentation of the moderns.”


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Lessons From a

Drawing Book The figure and portrait drawings that we often come across in textbooks and drawing manuals are there for a reason. Whether we want to learn about chiaroscuro, line, negative space or perspective, these great drawings have much to teach. by

KENNETH J. PROCTER

W

hen I teach drawing, I begin with chiaroscuro because I want my students to achieve solid, sculptural form right from the start. (There are other techniques for rendering solid form, but they are more abstract.) At the beginning, I want to train the eye, and chiaroscuro describes patterns of light and shadow that can be observed; learn the pattern and you learn to see better. Know the pattern and you can work from memory and imagination. Chiaroscuro is powerful. At its most fundamental, chiaroscuro starts with a single, direct light source, usually angling toward the subject from above and the side, as if from the sun or a window. Set up this way, light and shadow form patterns that are consistent, regardless of the subject. As volume curves away from the light source, the lightest and brightest areas fade to half-light. Just where form curves into shadow, we see the darkest values—the core of the shadow. Beyond the shadow core, opposite the light, shadows brighten from reflected and ambient light—light bouncing off the walls in the room or some other surface. This light within the shadow can be among the most subtle and beautiful passages in a drawing. Rendered in color, the effect can be breathtaking. To demonstrate chiaroscuro, I shine a spotlight on a ball, a tube, a cone and a box. These suggest the patterns for head, limbs and a pedestal. After they’ve had some practice, I show my students the work of Prud’hon (1758–1823). Standing Female Nude, Seen From Behind is a perfect example of chiaroscuro. This or another Prud’hon is in most drawing textbooks. It’s a beautiful setup. The light comes in at right angles to the artist, so the whole range of shadow spreads across the form. Prud’hon made the most of it. To the modern eye, the drawing is an old-fashioned academic study, an académie, but it’s an instructive setup. The shading is clear and


Standing Female Nude, Seen From Behind by Pierre-Paul Prud’hon, 1785–1790, charcoal heightened with white chalk on blue paper, 24 x 13 3 ⁄ 8 . Collection Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; Boston, Massachusetts.


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LEFT

Study of Flesh Color and Gold by William Merritt Chase, 1888, pastel, 18 x 13. Collection National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC.

OPPOSITE PAGE

Peasant of the Camargue (Portrait of Patience Escalier) by Vincent van Gogh, 1888 , brown ink over graphite, 19 7 ⁄ 16 x 14 15 ⁄ 16 . Collection Harvard University Art Museums, Cambridge, Massachusetts.

unambiguous—exactly what beginners need to see. I have tried to match the lighting—more precisely, the shadow. I can darken the studio. I have spots and floodlights. But the setup never looks like Prud’hon. The shadows on the live model lack the drama of the drawing. Maybe there is a trick to the lighting I have yet to learn, but I think the answer is artistry. For Prud’hon, the model was a point of departure. The shadows may have been faint and washed out, but he knew the pattern and his creative vision was clear. He enhanced the shadows and darkened the

104

background. He created the drama. Even observation requires artistry, and that is a fundamental lesson. A second lesson of the drawing is in the pose. Prud’hon’s model stands in a modified weight-shift pose—weight on a support leg, with the other leg relaxed. By leaning on the pedestal, she exaggerates the hip thrust and shoulder drop on the side of the support leg. From head to hip to heel, her pose forms an S-curve. As contour describes the edges of form, the shadow core meanders back and forth down the middle. Sometimes contour and core run parallel,


sometimes otherwise. They describe different dimensions. Outward contour defines the arc of the model’s thrusting hip; curving opposite, the shadow core tracks the rise and fall of the volume and describes form. Contour and chiaroscuro work in counterpoint. Chiaroscuro has a drawback: Colors turn gray in shadow, especially in the shadow core. Outdoors, the blue light of the sky can lend shadows a cool tone to very beautiful effect. Indoors, however, only one color of light is available, and shadows can gray. But artists have many ways to transform a potential drawback into a strength. Lighting his model straight-on, William Merritt Chase (1849–1916) banished shadows to her sides in Study of Flesh Color and Gold. The patterns of chiaroscuro shading are still visible but compressed to slivers. Clear of shadow, the model’s back is a clean, sensuous expanse, true in color and dramatically set off by her upswept hair. Flat lighting tends to flatten her back, but backs are flat anyway, so the trade for clean color is worth it.

H

owever a drawing textbook divides, line always gets its due. Van Gogh’s (1853–1890) work might appear in a chapter on line, or maybe one on pattern and texture. Often you see one of his landscapes with lines and dots, the abstract equivalents of impressionist brushwork. Lines and dots look like grass and f lowers. But a face is another matter. The equivalence of marks to subject is less straightforward.




105

You have to look at Peasant of the Camargue twice—once for the marks and once for the man. Van Gogh’s technique is not neutral and invisible the way a fine hatch of lines might be. His lines and dots call attention to themselves as marks, an aesthetic scheme that is somewhat independent of portraiture. For me, the marks are the star of the show. Likeness depends on the accurate description of features. Even caricature works that way—proportions are exaggerated, but shapes, however stretched, stay accurate. Lose the shape and lose the likeness. Van Gogh probably got a likeness. The peasant has character; he looks like somebody we would recognize. But Peasant is strange. Lines carved out

106

contours and cavities, yet the face is flat, like a mask, cheeks splayed wide, eyes set oddly apart, a likeness made shape by shape. Van Gogh’s penstrokes are so emphatic that the marks stay marks even while they describe. Marks sit on the paper and flatten the face. Heavy outlines reinforce the flatness. Even the background is strange. The dots can be read as an analogue for space, or maybe for surface, but they don’t stay in the background. They press forward and respond to the man and his hat. Whatever they represent, the dots are emphatically dots, rendering the idea of background into something both physical and abstract, foreshadowing the inventive complexities of abstraction and representation in early-20th-century art.


The Pacha

by Jean-Honoré Fragonard, ca. 1760–1790, brush and brown wash, 9¾ x 12 15 ⁄ 16 . Collection the Louvre, Paris, France.

I

n The Pacha, Fragonard’s (1732–1806) pyramidal composition takes you right to the top, where you see the face and immediately grasp the whole. But cover the face and The Pacha is barely comprehensible as a figure. Beyond the billowy clothing, the setting is hard to discern—cushions and creases at most—even when you know what to look for. Volumes and foreshortened forms turn into a swirl of abstract brushstrokes, deKooning-esque whiplash lines. Fragonard’s drawing is a lesson in how much information the


Fragonard’s drawing is a lesson in how much information the brain will supply to make sense of perception. brain will supply to make sense of perception. To learn from the drawing, analyze what the brain fills in. Go over it section by section. Ask what the lines and the spaces do. For example, the near leg bends and the knee projects. Fragonard indirectly showed that by means of the drapery. Each stroke of the brush describes a crease, each crease curved just so around the hidden knee. The fabric stretches taut over the knee, so no lines there, but all around, an amazing configuration of disconnected swirls somehow provides enough information to fill in the blank. No one line does the trick, it’s in the pattern. A drawing like this comes from instinct honed through practice. Practice builds skill right into the eye, hand and mind so that in the fervor of the moment, the drawing is instinctual and automatic. The Pacha is a performance. Fragonnard is like those violinists who play with frayed strings. If a string snaps in recital, improvising through to the end is high stakes and dangerous. Only skill and daring can pull it off. But stop to re-string and the performance is lost. Brushand-ink is like that; it leaves no room for error or overworking. That’s why The Pacha is in the drawing books.

shakes your sensibility. He could have cropped at the waist. He could have drawn the full figure. But he cropped right below the crotch. Schiele’s composition flaunts sexuality. The man flouted community standards—his work and his lifestyle once got him chased out of town. Self-Portrait is a work of his youth. Without clothes or setting, and sporting indeterminate tousled hair, there are few clues to the age of the drawing. It doesn’t look dated. It looks like it could have been drawn yesterday. The artist was 21, confessional and confrontational. It appeals to the brasher youth. And then there is the style. Like brazen adolescence, it flouts the

rules. Schiele’s line doesn’t trace anatomical contours; it gets at the lumpy, angular guts of the thing. It scribbles around. It cuts off limbs. Ruddy washes bruise his exposed, emaciated f lesh. Schiele’s expressionist style is archetypally modern, yet the precedent and pattern piece is Albrecht Dürer’s (1471–1528) self-portrait. Although self-revelation is common to both Schiele and Dürer, Dürer’s drawing is a product of his maturity and, according to scholarship, created in a period of convalescence. If the drawing is evidence, his recovery seems well along: His torso looks patterned on the muscular, classical cuirass. At least superficially, Dürer appears more fit than convalescent. Self-Portrait

by Egon Schiele, 1911, watercolor, gouache, and graphite, 20¼ x 13¾. Collection The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, New York.

F

lipping through a drawing book, Schiele (1890–1918) is hard to miss. His fullfrontal nude self-portrait grabs and



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Foreshortening, not modeling, gives Degas’ drawing dimension. The lines of perspective serve as pointers, reinforcing the gesture of the figure and the height of the space. 108



Schiele is beyond anorexic. Two examples may not prove a rule, but they fit Goethe’s famous characterization that classicism is health and that romanticism (and by extension, expressionism) is disease. To the beginner leafing through the drawing book, trying on styles to test the fit, Schiele may look like something readily mastered, as if passionate messing around will get you a drawing. Passion and confrontation may seem easier than quiet, introspective classicism. But passion isn’t easy to do well, and it can look contrived. Self-Portrait has a blunt, loud impact. Schiele died seven years after this drawing— much too young. Could he, like Francis Bacon a generation later, have sustained and developed his youthful angst throughout a career?

without much modeling, he f lattened the space and flattened the figure to fit the composition. Foreshortening, not modeling, gives it dimension. The lines of perspective serve as pointers, reinforcing the gesture of the figure and the height of the space. Still, she hovers. And that suggests a tradition transformed, perhaps with tongue in cheek. Famously, and in contrast to a long academic tradition of historical and mythical figures, Degas explored

modern times and people. Everyone knows about his focus on theater, ballet and the circus. Yet here, in the modern idiom, for the entertainment of the paying public, is the Baroque saint ascending into a domed illusion of heaven. The traditional and radical nature of Degas’ masterful drawings should get him a place in al l the drawing books. Degas surprises me again and again. 

I

first saw Degas’ (1834– 1917) Miss Lala at the Cirque Fernando and some related studies while preparing this article. As an artist interested in perspective, I was struck by how Degas had worked out the geometry of the ceiling. Although some of the Impressionists were criticized for lack of design and finish, Degas’ work was always carefully composed. For this reason, I usually include several of his paintings as examples when I teach perspective. The study for Miss Lala is no mere impression. It is a geometric projection of the ceiling structure. It is complex architecture: a polygon in plan, with foreshortened trapezoids rising toward a pinnacle. A very tricky construction, and it is this careful construction that gives the final work its rigor. After working out the geometry, Degas worked away from it. Ruled and measured lines are still clearly visible near Miss Lala’s feet, but his loose pastel treatment disguised most of the construction. He cropped close to the figure, and using local colors


LEFT

Nude Self-Portrait by Albrecht Dürer, ca. 1503, pen and brush, heightened with white on green grounded paper, 11½ x 6. Collec tion Klassik Stiftung Weimar; Weimar, Germany.

OPPOSITE PAGE

Miss Lala at the Cirque Fernando by Edgar Degas, 1879, pastel, 24 x 18¾. Collection Tate Gallery, London, England.


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ENDPAPER The Madonna and Child With Saint John the Baptist by Raphael, ca. 1507, black chalk with traces of white chalk, outlines pricked for transfer, 36 15 ⁄ 16 x 26 3 ⁄ 8 . Collection National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC.

L

et’s end on a High Renaissance note. For centuries the work of Raphael (1483–1520) has been considered the epitome of artistic grace, thanks in large part to the artist’s skill in arranging his figures into designs of unsurpassed harmony. We see one such compelling composition here, in a chalk cartoon for the oil painting of the same name, now hanging in the Louvre.

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