Drawings and the passage of time

As the years go by, time seems to fly past us. It is often through our children that we realize just how fleeting life can be. As a mother and figurative artist, I have done a number of drawings of my children, many of them while they were sleeping. There is something beautiful and intimate about people in slumber. My most recent sketch dealing with this subject is one I titled “Restless”, it depicts Felipe trying to nap in our most recent camping trip, after a difficult night because he wasn’t feeling well.

It seems like yesterday when Nicolas and Felipe were only babies. With this in mind, I thought it would be interesting to post sketches of my boys at different ages.  Below, you can see my most recent drawing of Felipe next to another of him as a  baby.  These were done nine years apart, both during family camping trips. The passage of time evident in the physical appearance of Felipe in each sketch.

My fascination with drawing my children hasn’t changed. Motherhood is a great adventure and one worth exploring through art. The drawings of my children go beyond description, the process of drawing is a record of my emotions and deep love for them.

The sketches below are of Nicolas, my firstborn. The first is one of a series of drawings that led to my first explorations with silverpoint, (two of these are featured in this post on silverpoint, https://adrianaburgosdrawing.wordpress.com/category/drawing-techniques/). The second is one during his toddler years after a walk in the stroller. Once again the juxtaposition of these images is evidence of the passage of time. Nicolas will soon turn 13 and is already taller than me. I look to the drawings of him as a baby as an important stage in my development as an artist.

Witnessing how my boys blossom into their own individual selves is amazing. I see traits of both my husband and I in both of them, yet they are also their own persons. Even though they change and mature through the years, their essence is ever present. 

It’s summer!!

Adriana Burgos, sketchbook study of trees, Hannah Park, sanguine and graphite on paper

Adriana Burgos, sketchbook study of trees, Hannah Park, pen on paper

Adriana Burgos, sketchbook study of trees, Hannah Park, black and sepia pen on paper

It’s summer and now that school ended, it’s time to reflect, re-charge, spend time with the family and get busy in the studio. To kickstart the season, I went camping to the beach in North Florida with my husband and two boys. We enjoyed a nine-day getaway, which was a great way to wind down from a busy and rewarding school year.

On this trip, we visited Hannah Park for the first time and really enjoyed the beach and the bike trails as well as the lush wooded campground. As usual, I packed up my favorite drawing supplies and sketchbook and worked on some nature studies of the vegetation and trees around our site.

In a couple of these drawings I set out to explore warm and cool temperature relationships by using the brown and the black or gray.

Adriana Burgos, sketchbook study of trees, Hannah Park, black and sepia pen on paper

Adriana Burgos, sketchbook study of trees, Hannah Park, sanguine and graphite on paper

I enjoy working with different media. Pen pushes me to explore value and mark-making through line, while sanguine and graphite offer more flexibility. The latter allowed me to mass, using the side of the drawing tool while also layering some line work and taking away with the eraser. Pen is less forgiving and forces me to make decisions through the additive approach of mark-making.

In both pen drawings, I set out to create emphasis in the compositions by developing some areas further and gradually easing to a contour line drawing.

I have found that when working with this medium, I enjoy emphasizing negative spaces to bring out the positive, something I admire in Corot’s landscapes which inspire me greatly when it comes to plein-aire work.

These nature studies take up quite a bit of my sketchbook work and I find it interesting because I don’t consider myself a landscape artist. The main motivation for these sketches is my love of nature and the act of drawing from direct observation. The process of recording what I am seeing allows me to really experience a particular place and I find it meditative.

Southern landscape in ink wash

Here is a little ink wash study I did years ago. This was done from direct observation at the Old Ebenezer Church grounds about 15 minutes from my home. The grounds of the church are beautiful, wooded with tall pine trees and large oaks overlooking Ebenezer creek.

I don’t usually work with ink wash, but it is a great medium to explore form and value. In this particular drawing I was exploring value to create a sense of atmospheric perspective, which can be achieved by decreasing the value range as the space recedes. In other words, a sense of deep space can be depicted keeping the darkest darks and lightest lights for the foreground and using gray values close in contrast in the background.

I’ve been thinking about dusting off my brushes and working some in watercolor and ink lately, so you might be seeing more water based drawings soon.

Adriana Burgos, Ebenezer, Ink wash study en plein air

 

Beach studies

“Ocean and sky study”, Adriana Burgos sketchbook study in oil pastels

Looking through my old camping journal,  I found these studies done at Hunting Island South Carolina. The first is in oil pastel which is a very fun medium for a painterly approach. The format of the drawing is 5.5 x 8.5 so there is not much room for details and meticulous drawing when using the oil pastel. It was a cloudy summer day and the water was choppy.

The drawing below was done with water-soluble watercolor pencils by Derwent. I really liked this set of colored pencils because the colors were not too saturated. There was a good number of earth tones, and greys. Here I drew the landscape first and then quickly captured the figures of the kids through gesture drawing. The children in the drawing are my boys Nicolas and Felipe with Raquel from our adopted family in Savannah with whom we share great memories.  I really like this piece as a study for a large drawing or painting. The great thing about sketchbooks is that you can revisit them and if a study stands the test of time it might be worth developing into a large piece.

“Kids on the beach” Adriana Burgos, sketchbook study in water-soluble colored pencils.

 

 

 

 

 

Life is fleeting

Life is fleeting, it goes by in a flash. I found some of my drawings of the boys from 2007, Felipe my youngest was just a baby and Nicolas must’ve been about 3 1/2. Now they are 9 and 12 and  getting so big. Before I know it Nicolas will be as tall as me.

Adriana Burgos, 2007, Nicolas and Felipe Sleeping, sketchbook drawing

Adriana Burgos, 2007, Nicolas and Felipe Sleeping, quick gesture sketchbook drawing

Adriana Burgos, 2007, Nicolas Sleeping, sketchbook drawing

Lately I’ve been thinking a lot about life stages and how age affects our body movements and gestures. These drawings of my kids’ early childhood contrast the ones I have been doing of my late father. The depiction of early life, late childhood, youth, midlife, old age is becoming really interesting to me. I remember back when I did the baby drawings of Nicolas I was afraid they were maybe too sentimental, but now I am so glad I did them and I see that work as part as a greater narrative.

Limited palette drawings

I don’t consider myself a landscape artist but when I go on camping trips with my family I love taking time out to draw nature from direct observation. These two studies are journal entries from my camping sketchbooks. The first  is a watercolor sketch of the woods in Stone Mountain. I did this while sitting at our campsite looking out to other campers among the woods. I used my travel watercolor kit and chose to work with a limited palette of earth tones. Limited palettes in color drawings keep the composition unified and can be a fun challenge for the artist, since it requires a simplification of the observed space on many levels, shape, form and color. This was done during the fall, so there was a red brown and orange dominance in the space as the leaves were turning.

Adriana Burgos, Sketchbook entry , Stone Mountain Campground, Nov 2008

Adriana Burgos, Sketchbook entry, June 2015

The second image is a mixed media drawing done at Driftwood beach in Jekyll Island this summer. I chose to use copic markers (which can resemble water color at times), graphite and multiliner copic markers. The great thing about using markers is that they are immediate and easy to use on the go, no need for water containers and brushes or palettes. They are great for color studies and their transparent quality allows for subtle value and color effects. It is important however to consider the paper you are using. In this case I worked directly on my multimedia sketchbook instead of working on the marker paper. The porous quality of my sketchbook causes the markers to bleed through. I don’t mind it much since the sketchbooks are very personal in my case. Once again I explored a limited palette, in this case, focusing on warm against cool temperatures, which is a fun way of using minimal color in a drawing. I enjoyed the balance between large value and color blocks and fine linear buildup with graphite and multiliner pens.

Study of cypress trees in warm and cool colors

This week I am sharing an observational sketchbook study I did on one of my recent camping trips to George L. Smith, a Ga state park with beautiful landscape. There are rows and rows of cypress trees in a lake. The swampy feel is unique to the area and can be so mysterious. I love the pattern made by the receding trees and the way they reflect on the water.

This was my first developed drawing with copic markers. I picked a blue grey with sepia to play the warm against the cool colors. These markers are great for layering thus achieving several gradations of value and color. I also added fine lines with copic multiliners. The drawing was done in my multimedia journal, next time I will use the marker paper.

More gesture drawings from karate

Adriana Burgos, line gesture, karate sketchbooks, copic multi liner

Adriana Burgos, line gesture, karate sketchbooks, graphite

Adriana Burgos, line gesture, karate sketchbooks, copic multi liner

Adriana Burgos, line gesture, karate sketchbooks, copic multiliner and graphite

Here are four pages of quick gesture drawings done while I watched my boys’ karate class. While drawing these, the students were waiting for their turn to spar. I was focusing on capturing the various sitting poses and observing the movement of the spine, and the tilts of the skull, ribcage, pelvis and extremities in just seconds.

After completing these, I enjoyed the narratives that emerged from the children’s interactions. That is the great thing about sketching from life.

In this grouping there are graphite drawings as well as pen drawings. I find myself using fine pen more and more because I can rely on the point staying sharp when I am not interested in erasing. I have learned a lot from these studies, you can see some of the large drawings that have resulted from this practice by clicking the karate series sub menu under portfolio.

Trees in charcoal

Drawing on site is such a wonderful way of connecting with nature. Here is a little study of trees done in Savannah’s beautiful Forsyth park. I was focusing on the light and dark tones of the trees and the receding space. The medium here is charcoal and the whites were achieved by erasing into the greys and blacks.

Adriana Burgos, sketchbook drawings, charcoal on watercolor paper

On Planar Analysis

People draw for many reasons, to communicate ideas, to brainstorm, design, create characters , express emotions, observe the world, to name a few. In drawing, like in many other artistic disciplines, it is important to build on fundamental concepts and processes in order to give free reign to your creativity. When it comes to the study three-dimensional form through drawing, understanding form is very important. There is a process many artists utilize to break down form called planar analysis.

Planar Analysis is the break down of a complex form into flat planes. It is very helpful when trying to achieve volume in drawings of irregular non-geometric forms. Applying planar analysis goes hand in hand with a structural or constructive approach to drawing and it is beneficial when working from direct observation and when inventing. When drawing from direct observation the artist is responding to the subject observed and re-interpreting the form. When working  from memory or the imagination an understanding of planes can help in the construction of a believable volumetric image.

Above, is a detail image of one of my drawings from the toy series at the planar stage. This post focuses mainly on the drawing process, but I will take this opportunity to write a little bit about how this body of work originated. At the time, as a mother of young children, toys were scattered all over the house and were part of my every day life. As a college art professor, teaching observational drawing inspired me to get back into drawing from life myself, and I found toys to be a great subject due to their interesting forms and the potential for the exploration of metaphor through the still life. For that series, I worked both on toys of organic and geometric form and thoroughly enjoyed the process. This dinosaur is of organic form since it is made to look life like. Below are the steps I took to get to the planar stage of the drawing.

Gesture

First I mapped a light intuitive gesture with vine charcoal which allowed me to see the composition on the page.  Vine charcoal comes off easily so I could make adjustments to the over all design  just a few minutes into the work.

intuitive gesture

Sighting the gesture

I kept refining the drawing by analyzing proportions, angles and alignment, which are all aspects of sighting and measuring. Some of you may be familiar with the process. As you can see, this next image shows further development. The horizontal and vertical lines surrounding the figure show the study of placement of the different parts to the whole. For example, where does the top of the back line up to the tail? Where does the top of the head line up to the legs? Where does the hind leg on the floor line up to the tail or other leg?. This is typically done after checking key measurements. I also observed the changes in direction of the curves by checking angles.

sighting the gesture

Analysis of planes

In this stage, you can see the break down of the object into planes. To break down the form into planes, an artist drafts a line at the edge where the surface changes direction showing that there is a turn. It is important to keep in mind that planes are always connected to one another and that perspective has an influence on the shape of the plane. When working with planar analysis, it helps to think as a sculptor and imagine that you are creating a three dimensional model of the subject with paper or cardboard. Ask yourself where you would fold the cardboard to turn the form and that would be where you draw the line that defines the plane change. Going from big to small planes is the most effective. It is important to practice the process over and over to fully understand it.

Value block-in

Planar analysis helps with the development of lights and darks (value) in a drawing. This image shows the initial stages of value development. I was aiming for simple patterns of light and dark shapes (three to four tones). This simplicity reinforces unity in a composition.

Finished piece

In the finished piece, you can see a wider range of lights and darks as well as mark-making that follows the form. In this particular drawing I had a lot of fun developing the surface of the surrounding space and using color emotionally. I found working on the toy series enriching and appreciated the narrative potential in the subjects I was using. It was also good practice to work from toy animals, fun and challenging at the same time. This led me to create a major assignment in which students draw animals from life-like toys for my Drawing II class. Teaching and learning to draw analytically is not necessarily easy. It takes transforming the way you see and understand form which is not always comfortable, but allows for growth.

More examples of planar analysis in drawing

A planar approach is widely used when drawing subjects such as the human form, animals, bones, drapery, fruits, vegetables, shoes and plaster casts are some great subjects to draw from when practicing planar analysis. Below are samples from one of my Life Drawing  class demos showing the progression of the structural study of a skull. The first image shows the intuitive gesture, this takes about one minute. Then comes the analysis of proportions angles and alignment, which can take about 20 minutes and finally the analysis of the planes. I consider each stage a layer in the drawing process.

The study from a life-like toy gator below shows the planar process as well. Many artists and designers construct their drawings this way; animators, concept artists, sculptors, industrial designers, painters  to name a few.  One important artist who relied on planar structure to create compositions was Luca Cambiaso click here to see one of his drawings from the Metropolitan Museum of Art collection: http://www.metmuseum.org/collection/the-collection-online/search/335650. Alberto Giacometti, one of my personal favorites created some wonderful planar studies as you can see in this group of drawings http://thefuturelab.org/2011/02/01/716/.

Keep in mind that planar analysis is a helpful approach in the study of volume through drawing, but not the only one. Many artists will use cross-contour or chiaroscuro to study the three-dimensional quality of a subject. Personally I am a big fan of constructive drawing and find that it helps me when drawing from observation, photo references and memory. To many this process may seem overly analytical at first but it can give you the freedom to develop your drawings loosely with a lot of expression yet maintaining clarity.  I hope you found this helpful. Come back and visit for future instructional material.