Forgotten Images from the Vault

A few days ago I was looking through an old portfolio.  It was full of older drawings and things from several years ago, and I wasn't entirely sure what I would find.  Since they were older I expected to find a lot of junk to throw out.  There was some of that, but not nearly as much as I expected.  What I did find were some of the things I did while relearning how to draw.  Some of them weren't half bad if I do say so myself.  At any rate I thought some of the old master copies would be of interest to you.  So let's see what I found.

Look familiar?  A nice little silverpoint copy of Leonardo's silverpoint study for an angel.  It's heightened with white chalk.  This is one of the earlier silverpoints I have done.  A handful came before this, but you don't want to see those.  Trust me on that one.  The ground is a watered down acrylic gesso toned with some dry pigment, prussian blue I think.

I love old master drawings.  The St Louis Art Museum has a gallery devoted entirely to works on paper, drawings, prints, the occasional watercolor, and I always make sure to spend some time in there.  When a list of the greatest draftsmen of all time is put together Leonardo is always on it.   Albrecht Durer always makes the list too.  If you're looking for drawings to copy he's got some nice ones.  He also has a great list of engravings.

Another pretty famous image.  Well, if you're going to steal, steal the best.  Now this isn't a bad bit of drawing considering it's me and all, but compared to the original it definitely blows chunks.  I've seen the original print several times, and it never fails to amaze me.  It's not very big, only about 10x 8, but there's a lot packed into that small space.

This might not be quite a well known, but still a pretty sweet image.  This is Goya's The Sleep of Reason Produces Demons.  It's from a collection of etchings (maybe they're classed as aquatints) Goya produced called Los Capricios.  Pretty sure I spelled that wrong, have to check.  For all the non-etchers out there an aquatint is a resin dusted over the plate.   The plate is heated just enough for the resin to melt creating a resist to the acid bath.  When etched it will result in a wash-like tone like the background here.  The longer the etch, the darker the tone.  In the case of my drawing here I used charcoal.  I always liked etching.  Really should have broken down and bought a press.

A copy of Rembrandt's etching Woman with an Arrow.  Another of the world's all time great draftsmen and one of the great etchers too.  Nobody's quite sure what's going on in this image.  Venus giving an arrow to Cupid?  Maybe, as good a back story as any.  Personally I don't really care much.  I just like the image.  That's the reason I did most of these.  I also tried to copy them as closely as possible, trying to figure out the whys and wherefores.  Honestly I don't remember what I learned on any individual drawing.  It was more of a cumulative effect.   I have sketchbooks full of quick versions of things like this and other assorted objects.  The more you do the better.   One more today.

Recognize this guy?  If you don't you're in the wrong place.  I'm sorry, you'll have to leave.  I can only take this inclusive stuff so far.  I mean we're talking Rembrandt here.  Okay, the pose is based on a rather well know Titian portrait, but this etching may well be equally famous, and I do like a good etching.

Last thought for the day comes from Rembrandt while we're on the subject.  "Take the brush in hand and begin.  When you have said all you wish say you're done."

Critters

I used to do a lot of pen and ink drawings. For some reason I got away from it. I may have to take another look at in drawings because I really like the look. These are some of the things I did, again older work until the new camera comes.


Sorry, not a really good picture of this, but it will have to do for the time being.


Every year the World Bird Sanctuary would invite their members out for a photography day. They'd place their birds in a more natural setting than the usual perch. It was a good time and you could get some pretty good pictures. They had this little guy sitting in the crook of the tree, and people were having a terrible time just finding the bird. It almost always had to be pointed out.


We seem to be lousy with raccoons around here. There's a family down the block that thought they were so cute. So they started feeding them. Well, that's fine except they don't stay down there. Just about every night they come up here and raid the bird feeders. Again, I can deal with that, just don't put out much seed before dark. Well, one night I look out the sliding door in the kitchen and my cat starts slowly backing away. That was strange because she usually ran around the house like crazy when she had a raccoon visitor. So I looked a little closer and saw that there was a family of five out there.

Gypsy Dancer 2

Pen & Ink
9.75 x 5

This is the second in the series. I think they make a rather nice pair.

Gyspy Dancer

Pen & Ink
9.75 x 5

I used to do a lot of pen and ink work, but have gotten away from it for some reason. That will have to change. Silverpoint and pencil are great mediums and each has its own beauty, but ink has a quality that neither of them has. Between the three, I don't think I need to look into any other drawing media. Well, maybe charcoal for bigger things, but I'll jump off that bridge when I get to it.

In this, the first of two drawings, I wanted to capture the movement and the attitude of the model. I really need to thank Sophie for being so expressive. This pose and subject seemed to need more power than silverpoint is really suited for. Pencil might have worked, but I wanted the bolder marks that ink gives. I hope it captured it.