Very important to grasp the information in this video, if there ever was a such thing as a secret to drawing he gives them all away here, very difficult to describe this process and Paul articulates it as well as is possible.
Although a sculptor is more form based, this quote is similar to what you refer to, “There’s this spot that has a form and is dark, to the side this spot that is long and at the end a little light, a zone with a highlight copying it in a dumb way” Michelangelo .He probably means when drawing from the model where his studies are more naturalistic . Learning to see without meaning attached to it , is observing. Knowledge is only used, when you desire to manipulate nature and design it. You need both. Great talk 👍
Thank you Paul for taking the time to elaborate. This is insightful. I like when you refer to the world being reduced to the flat stuff. It is comments such as these that bring to mind how the subject being depicted relates to rectangle picture plane. This is what I also find challenging-how to capture likeness while at the same time composing in relation to the whole ( the whole being not only all within the visual order, but also the whole rectangle (picture plane)). At times I feel I am faced with decisions that require me to chose between placing a key point in an area based on how it relates to the anatomy of my subject or how it relates to the rectangle. I recall in one of your videos you mentioned, and please correct me if I am mistaken, that you aren't as concerned with whether or not the proportions are totally accurate as much as you are with how well they relate to the composition ( or perhaps you said visual order). would you say the way shapes, lines and edges relate to the rectangle takes precedence over how accurate the likeness is true to the subject? As always, thank you for sharing your insights. Shawn
Do understand I actually mean the relationships of things when your world visual has been allowed to be perceived as merely a 2D problem and not about flat stuff within it. But I think you get me. On the second point you also hear me correctly just be clear that we are referring to the start phase. I don't respect work that is badly, falsely, drawn in the name of good composition...
Hi Paul, at 15:04 you talk about drawing objects vs drawing effects. What do "objects" and "effects" mean to you? I'm assuming you're alluding to a type of drawing where marks are used to circumnavigate an imagined conception of the subject's volumes/planes, vs drawing where marks are used to replicate shapes of value seen with the eye. Michelangelo vs Seurat. If that's the case, where would you place your drawings from memory? Lines hardly ever appear in nature, so using lines in those drawings, were you relationally measuring the contours of your imagined forms? And at 10:45 , was Degas referring to lines around an imagined object, or was he referring to the flat placement of lines on the paper, derived from 2D shapes observed on the retina? What about your Holbein and Ingres studies? If you agree that Holbein and Ingres both fall into the object camp, what would copying them according your tradition be like? You often describe the "visual order" and at 14:13 , an "order of appearance". Are you referring to squinting your eyes, and drawing in an order based on the shapes of values you see as you squint less? How does drawing contours fall into that? Your drawings are really beautiful and I want to better understand what your game is!
Object: Any physical thing. Drawing the contour of the object and the individual objects as the starting place even for painting a set up composition from life. This is what my memory training - all my training - from Gammell started with. I worked on it because I recognized I had never really isolated line, outline, contour, etc as a unique area for study and feared I might never have that opportunity with a trained eye again. We were taught to set up models to show strong contours (outlines if you like) so never had to 'imagine' them. Funny even when doing that I knew the 'line' I was drawing represented an actual value in nature, the dark at that point. Effects: Literally spots of contrast some of which are strong and some very weak the former of which are used to set up the visual impression within the rectangle. Some of my later memory drawings, the mass ones, are based on line-marking the leading effects and then quickly turning those points into silhouettes while losing what I can't see. I don't understand your use of the work “imagined” and then the following: “Are you referring to squinting your eyes, and drawing in an order based on the shapes of values you see as you squint less?,” needs clarification. Glad to continue this.
@@PaulIngbretson Interesting! So those figure drawings from memory were in fact based on form contours. But the contours weren't found by preconceiving forms as they're positioned in the model, rather by memorizing the silhouettes you saw after lighting up the model so? I'm getting a bit lost in your description of your later mass memory drawings. You used lines to mark on your paper the leading strong contrast (with a small dot, dash, or section of an outline?), and then you turned them into silhouettes? Was it silhouettes of the form or silhouettes of the shape of value you committed to memory? What do you mean by "losing what you couldn't see"? What had to be lost (leftover lines after making silhouettes?) and based on what "seeing" if you were drawing from memory? You've mentioned in other videos "articulation of lines", and you've referenced Sargent's desire to make the longest line possible. What are lines used for in Boston School Impressionism? By "imagined" I mean having a mental conception of an object/form which can be drawn from. Although Ingres and Holbein were definitely committed to a sense of realism and visual likeness, I think the techniques they used were entirely predicated on imagining the form and anatomy of their subjects. This interests me in particular because they used this prior knowledge of form to depict light. Ingres' use of line weight, halftones, and shadows are incredibly beautiful to me, and yet they clearly don't resemble what our eyes see. Same goes for Holbein - his form and cast shadows are drastically subordinated to his contour line, but his use of value is extremely tangible and life-like all the while. What are your thoughts on their working methods? How did they make decisions about value? My understanding of your type of drawing is that it derives from ocular observation. You observe the subject while squinting your eyes, which consolidates values and edges, enabling you to distill the leading contrasts of shape and value. You then copy the most useful meeting of these contrasts onto the page, relating them all to each other in terms of their positioning and their value. You keep working this way, squinting less and less as you go so that you slowly see more details. But your chief goal is to represent the right relationship of values and their positioning to each other. Are you also concerned with wrapping a line around a form?
Is contour drawing a form of this seeing with your eyes drawing? Also is it similar to sight size without the use of instruments other than the use of your eye?
Yes to the first part but not signt-size in that it is functionally relational. Having said that the occasional placement of a student's work alongside the model to appear the same in size isn't a bad for getting a quick and more or less objective 'fact' check.
Paul as you studied at the Arts Students League did you study with David Leffel for a period of time? Would share your opinion on his art further if so?
I did work one summer with him. Don't want to do a vidoe about him but at his best I found him to know how to "move paint" ie paint wet into wet as hadn't run into before. He didn't say much in critiques at all. Don't remember a thing. A generalization he once made and all I remember besides was that everything lives in its own atmosphere. Like some are trying to be Monet or Sargent he seemed oriented around looking like Rembrandt.
Ok, so this is the first video I have ever seen from you and I have to sat that if you have slowed your speech down in this one? There is no point in my watching any others because having watched 38 minutes I have no idea what you are talking about or what the ‘point’ of this video is. Very sorry.
Very important to grasp the information in this video, if there ever was a such thing as a secret to drawing he gives them all away here, very difficult to describe this process and Paul articulates it as well as is possible.
excellent talk, very helpful and much appreciated.
Although a sculptor is more form based, this quote is similar to what you refer to,
“There’s this spot that has a form and is dark, to the side this spot that is long and at the end a little light, a zone with a highlight copying it in a dumb way” Michelangelo .He probably means when drawing from the model where his studies are more naturalistic . Learning to see without meaning attached to it , is observing. Knowledge is only used, when you desire to manipulate nature and design it. You need both. Great talk 👍
Very nice reply, too, Antiguous.
Brilliant, highly articulate obfuscation.
Want to explain what was being obscured?
"Passive, servant mentality" " listening" wow!
Thank you Paul for taking the time to elaborate. This is insightful. I like when you refer to the world being reduced to the flat stuff. It is comments such as these that bring to mind how the subject being depicted relates to rectangle picture plane.
This is what I also find challenging-how to capture likeness while at the same time composing in relation to the whole ( the whole being not only all within the visual order, but also the whole rectangle (picture plane)).
At times I feel I am faced with decisions that require me to chose between placing a key point in an area based on how it relates to the anatomy of my subject or how it relates to the rectangle.
I recall in one of your videos you mentioned, and please correct me if I am mistaken, that you aren't as concerned with whether or not the proportions are totally accurate as much as you are with how well they relate to the composition ( or perhaps you said visual order).
would you say the way shapes, lines and edges relate to the rectangle takes precedence over how accurate the likeness is true to the subject?
As always, thank you for sharing your insights.
Shawn
Do understand I actually mean the relationships of things when your world visual has been allowed to be perceived as merely a 2D problem and not about flat stuff within it. But I think you get me. On the second point you also hear me correctly just be clear that we are referring to the start phase. I don't respect work that is badly, falsely, drawn in the name of good composition...
@@PaulIngbretson Yes and yes I do understand and had assumed as much. Thank you for the clarification!
💖
Hi Paul, at 15:04 you talk about drawing objects vs drawing effects. What do "objects" and "effects" mean to you? I'm assuming you're alluding to a type of drawing where marks are used to circumnavigate an imagined conception of the subject's volumes/planes, vs drawing where marks are used to replicate shapes of value seen with the eye. Michelangelo vs Seurat.
If that's the case, where would you place your drawings from memory? Lines hardly ever appear in nature, so using lines in those drawings, were you relationally measuring the contours of your imagined forms? And at 10:45 , was Degas referring to lines around an imagined object, or was he referring to the flat placement of lines on the paper, derived from 2D shapes observed on the retina?
What about your Holbein and Ingres studies? If you agree that Holbein and Ingres both fall into the object camp, what would copying them according your tradition be like? You often describe the "visual order" and at 14:13 , an "order of appearance". Are you referring to squinting your eyes, and drawing in an order based on the shapes of values you see as you squint less? How does drawing contours fall into that? Your drawings are really beautiful and I want to better understand what your game is!
Those all need clarifying, Kofi. Let me see how to get them into a video. Thanks,
Object: Any physical thing. Drawing the contour of the object and the individual objects as the starting place even for painting a set up composition from life. This is what my memory training - all my training - from Gammell started with. I worked on it because I recognized I had never really isolated line, outline, contour, etc as a unique area for study and feared I might never have that opportunity with a trained eye again. We were taught to set up models to show strong contours (outlines if you like) so never had to 'imagine' them. Funny even when doing that I knew the 'line' I was drawing represented an actual value in nature, the dark at that point.
Effects: Literally spots of contrast some of which are strong and some very weak the former of which are used to set up the visual impression within the rectangle. Some of my later memory drawings, the mass ones, are based on line-marking the leading effects and then quickly turning those points into silhouettes while losing what I can't see.
I don't understand your use of the work “imagined” and then the following: “Are you referring to squinting your eyes, and drawing in an order based on the shapes of values you see as you squint less?,” needs clarification. Glad to continue this.
@@PaulIngbretson Interesting! So those figure drawings from memory were in fact based on form contours. But the contours weren't found by preconceiving forms as they're positioned in the model, rather by memorizing the silhouettes you saw after lighting up the model so?
I'm getting a bit lost in your description of your later mass memory drawings. You used lines to mark on your paper the leading strong contrast (with a small dot, dash, or section of an outline?), and then you turned them into silhouettes? Was it silhouettes of the form or silhouettes of the shape of value you committed to memory? What do you mean by "losing what you couldn't see"? What had to be lost (leftover lines after making silhouettes?) and based on what "seeing" if you were drawing from memory? You've mentioned in other videos "articulation of lines", and you've referenced Sargent's desire to make the longest line possible. What are lines used for in Boston School Impressionism?
By "imagined" I mean having a mental conception of an object/form which can be drawn from. Although Ingres and Holbein were definitely committed to a sense of realism and visual likeness, I think the techniques they used were entirely predicated on imagining the form and anatomy of their subjects. This interests me in particular because they used this prior knowledge of form to depict light. Ingres' use of line weight, halftones, and shadows are incredibly beautiful to me, and yet they clearly don't resemble what our eyes see. Same goes for Holbein - his form and cast shadows are drastically subordinated to his contour line, but his use of value is extremely tangible and life-like all the while. What are your thoughts on their working methods? How did they make decisions about value?
My understanding of your type of drawing is that it derives from ocular observation. You observe the subject while squinting your eyes, which consolidates values and edges, enabling you to distill the leading contrasts of shape and value. You then copy the most useful meeting of these contrasts onto the page, relating them all to each other in terms of their positioning and their value. You keep working this way, squinting less and less as you go so that you slowly see more details. But your chief goal is to represent the right relationship of values and their positioning to each other. Are you also concerned with wrapping a line around a form?
Thank you.
You're welcome!
Is contour drawing a form of this seeing with your eyes drawing? Also is it similar to sight size without the use of instruments other than the use of your eye?
Yes to the first part but not signt-size in that it is functionally relational. Having said that the occasional placement of a student's work alongside the model to appear the same in size isn't a bad for getting a quick and more or less objective 'fact' check.
Paul as you studied at the Arts Students League did you study with David Leffel for a period of time? Would share your opinion on his art further if so?
I did work one summer with him. Don't want to do a vidoe about him but at his best I found him to know how to "move paint" ie paint wet into wet as hadn't run into before. He didn't say much in critiques at all. Don't remember a thing. A generalization he once made and all I remember besides was that everything lives in its own atmosphere. Like some are trying to be Monet or Sargent he seemed oriented around looking like Rembrandt.
Ok, so this is the first video I have ever seen from you and I have to sat that if you have slowed your speech down in this one? There is no point in my watching any others because having watched 38 minutes I have no idea what you are talking about or what the ‘point’ of this video is. Very sorry.
The secrets are only for those who have ears to hear...
Paul, come to Islam n success