Paper Bag Drawings

Paper Bag Drawings
Hey check out this blogsite to see another artist (lauren gallagos) drawing paper bags:
http://artbylauren.blogspot.com/2008/01/paper-bag.html

This week we continue VALUE by finishing up the paper bag drawings as well as beginning the drapery drawings found in the class still life setups.

Starting Value Drawings

American-born artist Vija Celmins is quite amazing at capturing the essence of his chosen subjects in art. He works from photographs and you can see why. As we study about value, line, texture and composition, his work always comes to mind.
Take a look at afterall.org for more information on his work.
http://www.afterall.org/onlinearchive.html?online_id=18

Wednesday Drawing: White/Black Still life

Positive/Negative Drawings

Starting the class with a few "negative drawings" is one way of introducing you to the space around object otherwise known as "the ground or negative space." The first art professor (Ezra Sellers) I had at Young Harris College in the mountains of North Georgia introduced our class to negative space drawings by asking us to take a pair of scissors and some black paper and cutting the space around the still life he had set up in class. We saw the space around the objects thus defining the object itself in silhouette. I still have those black and white paper collage drawings which I cherish because it was my first introduction to learning to draw. Once we found the negative shape then we were asked to place them together in a more formal way to create a larger more intricate composition.

Below are some examples of some negative space drawings (figure/ground drawings) from the web. Again, defining the space around objects and also creating interesting compositions.




Below I am including some amazingly beautiful drawings/prints by Ed Ruscha and Robert Longo. Ruscha has a long history of using graphite and intertwining the figure/ground relationships and building imagery. Examples of his work can be seen below:





The works by Robert Longo I'm including are usually positive images on a negative background. However, when you are looking at these drawings imagine he had drawn this in reverse. Meaning, what if his paper background were all BLACK and his drawing tools were white...then, indeed he would be creating negative space drawing. His drawings are seen below:





Here are a few Figure/Ground (Positive/Negative) drawings from last years summer class. Remember it's about composition as well as your interpretation and perspective.

Katie Banks


August McNab



Tas Muhammad


Forrest Briggs


Sasha Battle


Mary Helen Shepherd


Nick Wulforst


Krystle Wong


Ryan Buchanan


Maggie Monroe


Jess Wong


Chao (Carol) Zhang


Brian Egan


Sun Chu


August McNab


Avi Gelfond


Shaun Houlihan


Alex Clark


Arisha Parker

It's not where you start...it's where you finish

GRAPHITE PENCILS:
Made of powdered graphite (not lead) fired with clay, ranging in hardness from 6H to 8B, the softest, and encased in wood.

A good assortment for freehand drawing includes: HB, 2b, 4b, 6b, 8b.

Graphite is also available in bar, crayon, chunk, and powdered form.

Use paper with a smooth or hot press surface that has very little tooth or texture.

Can be erased; softer graphite smudges easily - can be controlled by spraying a synthetic fixative over the drawing.

Begin lightly with the hardest pencil and gradually darken the drawing with softer graphite. Do not put harder graphite over softer.

Use a light hand. Be careful not to score the paper surface with the harder pencils.

CHARCOAL:
Made from burnt wood.

Great for value studies. Gives us a sense of three-dimensional space and a great range of lights and darks with minimal effort.

Known for expressive, direct and immediate qualities. Can create bold, thick lines or be sharpened to a point for more detailed marks.

Use paper with a medium to heavy tooth or texture.

Can be erased; smudges easily - can be controlled by spraying a synthetic fixative over the drawing.

Charcoal comes in three basic types:
Willow charcoal is light-weight, hard and brittle. It is powdery and easily rubbed off.

Vine charcoal is a fine quality natural charcoal made from hardwoods, which offers a full range of tone, yet is easily erased or blended with a paper stump.

Compressed charcoal is made of powdered charcoal and is available in varying degrees of hardness. It has a good overall considency, but its dense tone can be difficult to erase and blend. It is available in squared bars, rounded crayons, pencils, chunks, and powdered.

Begin lightly with the hardest charcoal and gradually darken the drawing with softer charcoal. Do not put harder charcoal over softer.

Break into small pieces or sharpen for better control.

Use a light hand. Build up your darker values slowly after fixing each layer to control smudging. Make sure to erase any smudges or finger prints before fixing.

The History of Pencils: Over 400 years old

A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE PENCIL

The first 'lead pencils', in today's sense, originated from England where graphite was discovered in the Cumbrian Mountains. At that time it was believed that 'lead ore' had been found. Hence the name lead pencil. It was only at the end of the 18th century that the chemist Karl Wilhelm Scheele proved that the lead pencil contained graphite (carbon) and not lead.

The graphite from the Cumbrian mine in England was exploited to such an extent that the English government set the death penalty on its export.

The quality of the English graphite and the pencils made from it continually decreased. It was only through its monopoly position that England could also sell these inferior pencils at high prices. Binding agents like glue, rubber, tragacanth etc. were added in order to make the graphite last longer.

The lead pencil first appeared in Germany in 1644 in a notepad belonging to an Artillery Officer. Caspar Faber started up his own pencil manufacturing business in Stein near Nuremberg in 1761.

Decisive for the flourishing of the lead pencil industry in Germany was the, at that time revolutionary, contribution of Lothar von Faber during the 19th century. It was through Lothar von Faber, later appointed Imperial Counsellor, that the Nuremberg area developed into the centre of the German lead pencil production.

From 1839 onwards, he improved the so-called clay-graphite process, a process which was almost simultaneously invented by the French Conté and the Austrian Hartmuth at the end of the 18th century. Since that time, ground graphite and clay have been mixed, shaped into graphite strips and fired. It was the mixing of clay and graphite which now also made it possible to manufacture pencils in different grades of hardness. Lothar von Faber increased the efficiency of his factory. A water power facility was installed, the sawing and grooving of the wood was mechanised and a steam engine increased production rationalisation. The path to large-scale industry was free.

In 1856, he purchased a graphite mine not far from Irkutsk in Siberia. The graphite from this mine was at that time the best graphite available. Before this 'black gold' could be transported by sea from the nearest port, it had to be transported immense distances overland on the back of reindeers.

The factory owner also did something else which was exceptional at that time: He printed his name on his quality pencils - the first brand-name writing utensils in Germany were born. Lothar von Faber is recognised as the creator of the hexagonal lead pencil and he established length, strength and hardness grades standards which were adopted by almost all other manufacturers.

This made the 'Faber pencils' the synonym for quality pencils per se as early as the middle of the last century. He also placed importance on the best quality for labels, catalogues and packaging.

He was also the first among the lead pencil manufacturers to travel throughout Germany and abroad with samples of his product range. He demanded reasonable prices for his pencils, prices which were otherwise only attained by the 'English products'. His pencils became sought-after products in Germany and abroad in the middle of the last century.

Other Nuremberg lead pencil factories followed his example. Companies like Staedtler, Schwan, Lyra and others were founded during the 19th century. At the end of the 19th century, there were about 25 lead pencil factories in Nuremberg producing annually up to 250 million pencils with a value of 8.5 million Marks. Faber alone, the largest company of its type, employed 1,000 people. The world-wide lead in the lead pencil manufacture was thus transferred completely to Germany and concentrated in and around Nuremberg.
Remarkable is the early internationalism in the lead pencil business: From 1849 onwards, Lothar von Faber founded subsidiaries in New York, London, Paris, Vienna and Petersburg. His trading success extended to the Middle East and even to China.

In order to protect himself from frequent name theft, he submitted a petition for the protection of brand products to the Imperial Diet in 1874. This law took effect in 1875. Faber was therefore also a pioneer of the uniform proprietary right in Germany.

The quality and the manufacturing process of lead and coloured pencils have seen continual improvement from the pioneer period to the present time. Although shape and look of the pencils are still the same today, the earlier pencils cannot be compared to the purity and reliability of today's products. However, FABER-CASTELL with its annual production output of more than 1.8 billion wood-cased pencils is still the most important manufacturer in the world.

courtesy of http://www.faber-castell.de/10347/Products/Pencils/index.aspx

Vincent Van Gogh

"I meant to tell you about some pencils I've discovered, made by Faber. They're this thick, very soft, and a superior quality to carpenters pencils. They produce a capital black and are very agreeable for working on large scale studies."
Vincent Van Gogh in a letter to the Dutch painter, Anton van Rappard

"In spite of everything I shall rise again:
I will take up my pencil, which I have forsaken in my great discouragement, and I will go on with my drawing."

Vincent van Gogh, Letter 136, September 24, 1880