Tate summer 2011 doodle

As I haven't actually done a big doodle yet I thought that my first impressions of the summer Tate St Ives exhibition would be a good subject to try and record.

So- there's a bit of everything here, from the Breon O'Casey on the stairs, Naum Gabo's wonderful studies and models, a Lucio Fontana (complete with an incised strip for authenticity), a Margaret Mellis assemblage, pastel stripes from Agnes Martin, and the black streaks on the lower left are a quick impression of Roman Ondak's Mapping the Universe work, which involves every visitor being measured against the wall and their name and date added. And of course Martin Creed's balloons nestling below the Porthmeor sea , the lichen covered rooftops, and the fog bank lurking offshore. Lastly, not forgetting Anri Sala's video Ghost Games, a torchlight game of tag with ghost crabs on the sand, shown in the darkened space of the Apse (have you found the crab yet?).

Actually I've seen so much today that I think this helped to put it in a manageable perspective, I'll be writing on my thoughts on each artist very soon.

The end result from a long day

I was supposed to have gone to a life class today, however, due to having worked 50+ hours last week I was too tired today to be going anywhere. I also found it difficult to settle to anything and in desparation decided to go and draw the steps in our back courtyard to practice perpective, by way of a follow-up to the drawing of boxes. To shake myself up a bit I grabbed a silver metallic marker and a sheet of dark blue Murano paper.

I found the sloping sides of the old oil tank to the right to be quite a distraction in getting the step edges correct, and as I was using an indelible pen I had to really concentrate. I didn't quite get the upper steps right, and got carried away drawing the shelf of tiles that I forgot the doorway of the logshed bisected them.

Feeling rather dissatified I went back in to type up a commentary on a van Gogh drawing. Having done this, I began to look online for some further information about van Gogh's drawing techniques, and found myself on the website of the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art. Their interactive kids zone included an online doodling app so inevitably I started to try it out. I find digital drawing difficult and frustrating, this only gave you 4 line widths and black, which I think simplified it no end. I produced a suggestion of a landscape- interestingly drawn with the mouse using my wrong hand- I use a mouse with the right hand but write and draw (mostly) with the left. I then noticed you could print out your mini masterpiece so here it is below.

Feeling rather more motivated at this point I went to try out a new set of conte pastels and produced a doodle which started to turn into a still life, though of eggs or loaves I'll leave you to decide. I worked on Murano paper which although it has a textured surface seemed to get saturated with pastel quite quickly, despite trying to apply it thinly in layers

At this point I was forced to abandon work as shopping, cooking and my son turning up unexpectedly used up the rest of the afternoon, and it wasn't until after dinner that I decided to tackle a subject I see every day- the saucepans lined up on the shelf above the range. As they're cylindrical they made a good subject for my next required exercise. I used a 3B pencil on cartridge paper.

They proved quite difficult particularly the ellipses at the bases, as some protrude over the shelf edge and others don't. Having established the basic shapes they looked quite bland until I had outlined some of the shadow and highlight areas on them.

By this point I really had the drawing jag going and went back to the studio as I realised that I had more than enough cylindrical shapes in there. I gathered up paint cans, masking tape, paint and mediums and arranged them on a table, adding a brush to unify the objects.

I decided they looked best in a square frame, and pencilled in the main shapes before inking with a disposable sepia indan ink pen.
I've left the arrangement as it is because I want to try a version using cross-hatching and contour shading. I also think its a nice group to practice negative space observation, so if the weather isn't kind enough to go out tomorrow I will have no excuse not to draw something!

Doodles Away! Experiments with linear media

Mark making Investigation-

 Findings, observations and emotional responses

Charcoal

• Messy and loose
• Promotes fast drawing and less detailed style, focuses eye on tonal values rather than linear detail.
• Actually quite sensitive and picks up marks from beneath surface, which can be used to effect e.g. old tape residue on drawing board gives an additional and accidental frame shape/ partial frame to composition
• Thin sticks rapidly develop a chisel edge when used at an angle but soon lose this when utilised- easily maintained with scrap paper or sandpaper
• Instant dark tones, removes any chance of being hesitant with darks
• Highlights need to be cleaned up with a plastic or putty eraser to maintain them
• Easily wiped off or added to
• Works best on a slightly rough or toothed surface
• Fixative essential
• Damp cloth needed to wipe fingers on!
• Emotional response-  forces one to think big-  “where’s a bigger bit of paper?”

Conte stick

• Denser than charcoal and less readily erased
• Plastic or baked (?) coating sometimes gives unpredictable results when using side of stick
• Can be hard to hold comfortably as very narrow- new sticks require some scribbling/sanding to shape end of stick to a drawing point
• Is a type of hard pastel and will easily blend with either media strokes or a tool- useful for landscape sketches using 3 or 4 colours (white, black, sepia, sanguine)- a silicone shaper tool is useful for more precise manipulation
• Works on a range of surfaces but less likely to adhere on smooth ones
• Fixative needed to preserve image
• Probably good for linear life studies- will try out at drop-in classes-classical artists (e.g. Degas) have used a black/white/sanguine combination to good effect
• Emotional response- I LOVE this! (But I would REALLY like the stuff to erase more easily when I go horribly wrong…)

Art Marker

• Permanent solvent-based ink, can be dissolved with “blender” marker or liquid solvent.
• Hard edged marks best used in graphic style contexts
• Bleeds through most papers except custom marker pads
• Works on a range of surfaces
• Needs confidence to draw directly as mistakes cannot be removed or covered up- thus good for focussing observation
• Tone can be built up by repeating 2 or 3 layers of ink- more noticeable effect with lighter tones
• Emotional response- “OMG I have to get this right first time! Oh-err…actually if I just doodle a bit I’m getting some really cool results…”

Graphite stick 6B

• Satisfying chunky shape, easily held both as a pencil and baton
• Large surface area as the whole stick makes marks
• Relatively clean in use
• Can be smudged and erased, easier to achieve on smoother surfaces
• Has a silvery sheen most noticeable when applied thickly
• Fixative preferable as thick application will rub off on adjacent pages
• Tends to “skip” if surface is damp (discovered while sketching in rain)
• Produces a glossy dark line if dipped in white spirit or turps- Ben Nicholson used this to good effect in his still life and landscape drawings on textured surfaces
• Emotional response- the chunky shape lessens inhibitions and makes it less important to draw as an “adult”- you have a large mark-making tool, let’s see what happens!

Biro

• Weapon of choice in the office as usually only one available!
• Permanent mark but ability to give fine and sensitive lines
• Can “blob” in hot weather or when getting to end of life
• Best used on a smooth surface such as card, printer paper, bristol board
• Doesn’t blend but subtle colour tones are achieved with fine pointed pens (green,red,blue,black) –have seen some fantasy art in Wadebridge and TV (early 1990s?) produced in this medium
• Emotional response- Is so universal it is difficult to isolate an immediate emotional response to, tends to be taken for granted
• p.s. I just had to draw the dead flies- but they did show how sensitive biro can be in sketching...

Chinagraph

• Tacky/sticky texture is off-putting at first- not quite wax or oil
• Very soft and loses point quickly
• Limited colour range
• Designed to write on most surfaces
• Repels water (to a point- watercolour remained stained across it)
• Difficult to blend- maybe with solvent?
• Emotional response- disappointing, probably limited use unless a particular technique is identified in experimentation with other media

White “carbon” pencil

• Rather chalky texture, easily blended
• Likely that the pencil used was of inferior quality, came from a gift set of drawing items
• Holds point well
• Emotional response- I like the pulling of “light out of dark” and have always found it easier to work tonally this way in a range of media. Would probably find white conte crayon a preferable medium. White on black assists the composition of nocturnal subjects or low-lit portraiture- I am planning to work up a sketch of a miner using this technique from a photograph on display at Geevor

Metallic pens

• Designed for craft use
• Have an even width of line
• Write on most surfaces but not brilliantly reflective unless on dark ground
• Do not blend readily and in some cases appear to counteract each other and dull- maybe they utilise irridescent pigment particles which cancel each other out by their respective refractive qualities?

Black carbon pencil

• Smooth, almost crayon texture, deceptively soft although point holds well
• Matt black
• Photographs very well so would be good for reproduction of image

HB pencil

• Range of tones
• Erasable
• Easily portable, does not need immediate fixing. (Higher grades of B do)
• I have taken pencils for granted to now as the primary choice for drawing, but now prefer the bigger working surface of graphite sticks except for applying fine detail, hatching or stippling

Drawing pen (Pilot 0.1mm)

• Fixed width line, pens available in 3 or 4 widths
• Faster strokes can show sensitivity and tonal graduation
• Large areas of solid tone difficult to achieve
• Good for stippling, hatching and hard edged subjects
• Needs good observational skills as mistakes cannot be erased
• Reproduces well providing no pencil guide marks remain
• Have used extensively in the past but less so now as eyesight not as good for sustained close-up detail work

Fountain Pen

• Can be very unpredictable depending on how often used and atmospheric pressure, flooding or refusing to flow.
• Has a certain sensitivity of line depending on nib shape
• I used to have a calligraphic set and enjoyed drawing with a wide left-oblique nib which suited my left-handedness and produced a satisfying range of line width.

Dip pen and ink (acrylic ink used)

• Takes practice to learn how much ink is loaded
• Line varies with ink capacity and is generally short in length
• Sharp point of nib can snag on paper surface, best on smooth parchment or vellum
• Emotional response- too much like hard work! Only possess a dip pen for applying very fine detail with white ink where a brush is too thick

Brush and ink

• Rigger brush holds ink well and creates flowing  and sensitive strokes, which “dry-brush” as ink runs out
• Range of marks depends on brush- chisel edge and obliques have calligraphic quality but hold less ink. Rounds need to be held upright and higher up handle to make the fullest range of marks.
• Similar technique to “one-stroke” folk painting applications
• Unable to locate my sword-liner brush to experiment with long bristles!
• Ink can be diluted to produce a range of tones

Soluble brush pen

• Sensitive and variable line
• Can be diluted with water
• Double ended with bullet point for finer detail
• Available in useful range of colours including pastels
• Easy to use
• Emotional response- I used to use a grey-blue, neutral grey and olive green as staple drawing tools for quick landscape reference- some have expired now but the remainder still have possibilities- interesting to have rediscovered them!

I still have a few other media to work through and will share these in a future post.