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Day 37: More notes and quotes from Steve Huston’s ‘How to Draw Hands’ lecture.
Day 37b: The top left quote hits a personal note. I’ve played classical piano most of my life and it has to be done exactly as the composer wrote it. I’m still wrapping my head around the concept that in art, it’s not only okay not to just make reproductions of the old masters, it’s not even considered outside of studying to learn. That it’s okay to have a unique voice. That concept is going to take some serious relearning. However because of piano, I also understand why we learn from the old masters and honour their legacy. Bottom right is my first rough attempt at using the lecture material to draw from photo reference. NB the hatching should follow the form 🙄…I forgot…
Day 38: Steve Huston said that Albrecht Dürer worked slowly and I take comfort from that because I do too. I just take more information in and learn more thoroughly when I take time to analyse and draw. I also enjoy it more. I will come back and render these once I’ve done a few. For now, I enjoyed putting the construction information I’ve been learning in the lectures into practice.
Really nice work Deborah 🙂. I also love Albrecht Durer’s work. I went to a museum about 10 years ago where they had a collection of his woodcut prints. Amazing how much detail went into those.
Thanks Bryan 🙂. That’s amazing that you got to see those! Which museum was that?
Day 39: I’m really enjoying drawing these. Hands are so expressive.
These are really great drawings Deborah! It is amazing how lively and engaging these hands look like! Just curious, did you use an overhand grip while you drew and how large did you draw?
At the moment I find myself struggling as much with the new grip as with the subject matter itself, double whammy. The marks produced are not exactly what I like and overall it is lot harder to work than with the regular writing grip. For example during a long phone call I had today I drew and scribbled with the writing grip and it felt so good. I guess these are necessary growing pains and I will have to overcome it with persistence. I can’t wait till is starts feeling more natural. On a positive side, I am now drawing larger and the lines are more fluent, although not very well articulated.
Good luck and keep up good work, your progress really shows!
Hi Gordan. Thanks for your kind comments! This hand drawing is 20 x 25 cm / 8 x 10” The page is in my 9 x 12” sketchbook.
I do draw with an overhand grip now. I also found it really difficult to begin with and I still don’t quite freewheel above the page like Steve and Glenn do. I started out by following Iliya’s way of holding the pencil – overhand, but with the end of the pencil pressing into your palm instead of sitting below it. This means you get a ‘better’ (my opinion) angle for the pencil to make crisper lines on it’s tip and not so much on its side. I also planted my little finger on the page – either my knuckle or fingertip to anchor my hand to the page. As I got used to holding the pencil this way, I dropped the fingertip except when trying to avoid smudging and I found I could slide my little finger knuckle across the page as I drew, so I was no longer moving my wrist, but drawing from my elbow/shoulder. I still have the side or knuckle of my little finger in contact with my page, but it is very light contact – just enough to give me a touch of steadiness. I don’t know if this is ‘correct’, but it has made it possible and it gives me that desired freedom of drawing using my whole arm and not my wrist, which I believe is the point of the exercise. Does that help?
Thanks again 🙂
Yes it does, thanks a lot for the detailed description!
I am for the most part trying to work as Glenn and Steve, occasionally experimenting as Iliya. I agree with you, Iliya’s way gives a crispier line, but the other two approaches provide with more control of hand movement. As long as the movement is coming from the shoulder or elbow and not wrist I consider it acceptable. I imagine it is a personal thing, it will take some time to refine and adopt the grip that is most comfortable, provides the most freedom of movement and sufficient control.
Hi Deborah,
To jump in into the discussion I would like to now how you approach aimed or precise lines with a goal and curves + ellipses.
If I look at your hand drawings, for example day 38 & 39, they look so clean and precise like you nailed them in one go.
I know there is basically the slow way there you try to be more careful with your movement which is more precise but makes the lines look a but “wobbly” or unstable. And there is the approach there you “ghost” the movement and then commit to it in the same bold speed, even curves and ellipses are drawn in one go.
I ask because these are the type of marks I got the most problems with. I have practised both approaches endlessly but I still feel like having no control over my curves and ellipses.
Beside that I for my part tried to practise many different grips and movements like the fingers for tiny careful Inking, the wrist for gestural big curves and the arm for general drawing. For that reason I never really hold the pencil in the same way and thought that would lead to being as versatile as possible.
But because I still feel unstable/unsure if trying to execute lines and curves that have a goal and need to be more precise aswell as often having problems with certain angles if not rotating the page I’m not sure if that train of thought was a mistake 😅
Anyway back to your topic! Despite your hands looking really good I think you can really see how your studies of different subjects like the head influenced and improved the way you take notes and practise. They all look consistent and are helpful not just for you, so thank you for that 😅👋
Excellent work Deborah and very interesting discussion here. I especially like hearing your thoughts on classical music and precision, the necessity of following the composers intentions. I think it’s necessary in classical drawing in the beginning too. It’s just that artists need to free themselves up once they’ve learned. I think it was John Carlson who said something like” you can’t paint what you don’t know”
Hi Christopher! Thank you and I’m glad my notes can be of use to you 🙂.
I definitely don’t get the correct lines in one go and I don’t draw fast lines at any stage of my process. I do plenty of erasing (I know Steve and Glenn leave their extra lines in, but I find them confusing so am better off without them)! I first sketch out the construction, then the forms using the kind of loose strokes I described to Gordan, using my arm not my wrist, but with such light pressure that I barely make a mark. The light contact my hand has with the paper gives me enough stability to make the line go where I want it to go. I think that because my hand is very relaxed, I don’t get the wobbles you’re mentioning. Once I’m ready to commit to a line, I make sure I know exactly where I want to put it and then put it in with a little more pressure, but still with a very relaxed hand. I’m confident it’s tension in the hand that causes the wobbles. Even when holding a pen, you can slide your hand on the page and draw from your elbow/shoulder and not from your wrist. Because I slide my hand over the page as I draw, drawing curves that go against the natural flow of my hand really isn’t an issue as I just slide according to the curve. Does all of that make sense? This is just what I’ve found works for me. I wouldn’t say you’ve made a mistake by practicing a variety of ways of drawing – I don’t know enough to know; you may end up more skilled because of it, but also I would have thought your brain needs to automate a method of working at some point and that may be more difficult if you keep throwing different techniques at it??? I’m not sure.
I’ve had to really examine myself for answers to even basic things like how to draw a line. You’ve seen me say I need to put my perfectionism away and loosen up and I guess I’ve looked at others and thought ‘I should do it like them.’ But through the period of these challenges, I’m coming to accept that it’s okay to be me and to embrace the way my brain works; to accept the nature of my personality. I’ve been detailed and particular since I was very little and I think it’s okay not to fight that but to lean into it. I guess I say this because everyone has their own personality and so everyone will have their way of working that suits them (beyond the hard skills that we all need to learn).
Thankyou Deb 🙂. I agree – no you can’t draw/paint what you don’t know. I’m so appreciative to NMA for this – we have the opportunity to learn the depth of skill to then take forwards. Having the skills opens doors of possibility and I’m excited by that.
Day 41: Today was extremely busy, so I haven’t had time to finish. The whites are too bright on the second hand (was bottom, now left) and there’s more to do. I’ll reassess the values and finish this off tomorrow. To give you a change of scenery or perspective and because they’re hands so I can, I thought I’d post this in a different orientation 🙂
Edit: …except that they’re now lit from the bottom left which looks odd… I’ll turn them back up the right way tomorrow!
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