Art kvetching
There are four (maybe more) tomatos on the one plant. They're little and green and have a bunch of growing to do but they're mine all mine.
Had midterm on Wednesday with Dan. Our model didn't show up, and that was annoying. I'm so behind on homework but he's not tres concerned about that. And there's still two weeks to go in term. I could easily get it finished. I just need to settle in and do it.
Back to midterm. The same thing happened Spring term. Sort of. Then I actually looked through my drawing pad more. But looking through with Dan I was struck by how good my line drawings are (and conversely how putrid my charcoal/tonal things are).
So I am resolved. I'm going to be a bit of a rebel. I'm going to slow down. I'm going to stop trying to please him as much. I might throw out the damned vine charcoal. That stuff is just annoying. Okay, maybe I'll do a bit of a gesture with it, just to make sure I like my drawing placement. Then I'm going straight to the hard, yeah, you heard me, the hard charcoal pencil and I will do a decent sketch of the figure. I will not dither around on it, then again, I will not jump in to doing the toning right off. I will not block in the shadows so quickly. And when I have a decent sketch, I will start blocking in shadows, but I will not lose my underdrawing to it. I don't know how I'm going to do this. I wonder about using the powdered charcoal, trying to do something with that.
Trouble is, he wants us to block in the shadow mass all at once and then pull off the extra charcoal, lighten areas as needed. But making the shadow mass a single value to start with obliterates the underlying sketch and I will not get it back. And then I struggle to get the shadow values separated. The darkest dark is, most likely, going to be on the body, the cast shadow behind is going to be lighter, at least a nine to the body's ten. I'm thinking of bringing the shadow to the underdrawing's outline, using hatching, and then rubbing the hell out of it.
Have a number of different papers, some white Rives, but also some colored, as well as some Canson mi-teinte. And another gessobord. I'm going to ask if I can do my self portrait on the gessobord. I'm thinking of throwing in my first experiments with color, some gouache, or pastel, or watercolor. Can't hurt to ask.
Have started some manure tea. Yum. Also planted, finally, the last tomato plant and the eggplant. I have one little white turmeric. The other bits of rhizome did not sprout anything. We've had little bits of rain chez moi but not enough to keep the plants going, the water-loving ones anyone. I've had to water the basils and mints a couple times.
I'm going to attempt successive plantings of lettuce seeds and hope to harvest enough for the occasional small salad once in a while. Black seeded simpson is supposed to be especially successful for Florida, even further south than Gainesville.
Had midterm on Wednesday with Dan. Our model didn't show up, and that was annoying. I'm so behind on homework but he's not tres concerned about that. And there's still two weeks to go in term. I could easily get it finished. I just need to settle in and do it.
Back to midterm. The same thing happened Spring term. Sort of. Then I actually looked through my drawing pad more. But looking through with Dan I was struck by how good my line drawings are (and conversely how putrid my charcoal/tonal things are).
So I am resolved. I'm going to be a bit of a rebel. I'm going to slow down. I'm going to stop trying to please him as much. I might throw out the damned vine charcoal. That stuff is just annoying. Okay, maybe I'll do a bit of a gesture with it, just to make sure I like my drawing placement. Then I'm going straight to the hard, yeah, you heard me, the hard charcoal pencil and I will do a decent sketch of the figure. I will not dither around on it, then again, I will not jump in to doing the toning right off. I will not block in the shadows so quickly. And when I have a decent sketch, I will start blocking in shadows, but I will not lose my underdrawing to it. I don't know how I'm going to do this. I wonder about using the powdered charcoal, trying to do something with that.
Trouble is, he wants us to block in the shadow mass all at once and then pull off the extra charcoal, lighten areas as needed. But making the shadow mass a single value to start with obliterates the underlying sketch and I will not get it back. And then I struggle to get the shadow values separated. The darkest dark is, most likely, going to be on the body, the cast shadow behind is going to be lighter, at least a nine to the body's ten. I'm thinking of bringing the shadow to the underdrawing's outline, using hatching, and then rubbing the hell out of it.
Have a number of different papers, some white Rives, but also some colored, as well as some Canson mi-teinte. And another gessobord. I'm going to ask if I can do my self portrait on the gessobord. I'm thinking of throwing in my first experiments with color, some gouache, or pastel, or watercolor. Can't hurt to ask.
Have started some manure tea. Yum. Also planted, finally, the last tomato plant and the eggplant. I have one little white turmeric. The other bits of rhizome did not sprout anything. We've had little bits of rain chez moi but not enough to keep the plants going, the water-loving ones anyone. I've had to water the basils and mints a couple times.
I'm going to attempt successive plantings of lettuce seeds and hope to harvest enough for the occasional small salad once in a while. Black seeded simpson is supposed to be especially successful for Florida, even further south than Gainesville.