Thurs. Jan. 27 IDEAL SOLIDS

Thursday began with a lecture on Composition.  We discussed Unity, Balance, Movement, Closure, etc. Next we made drawings of Ideal Solids - standard geometric forms found in many everyday of objects. The forms consist of the cone, sphere, cube, cylinder and open cylinder.  After drawing the basic form in structure, values were applied to give a sense of volume and light.  When rendering light, look for the six categories: cast shadow, reflected light, core shadow, shadow, light and highlight. Alissa Griffin's drawing (above) makes good use of additive as well as reductive drawing techniques.  Note how she uses the eraser to drag the materials across the contours of the forms (cross-contouring).  This not only creates a very volumetric or three dimensional form but adds a textural quality as well. Hollister Nadeau's (below) drawing exhibits smooth, gradual rendering of the dark to light value transitions.  This is achieved primarily by rendering the values with charcoal pencil and following the cross-contours. Both of these drawings are texturally rich because the students did not overly smear the charcoal.  It's okay to push the material around but you will create greater textural interest by drawing back over the smeared surface.