[Christopher]

Hi Gordan,

now that I’m doing figure drawing too, I’m able to acknowledge and admire how you treat your cross contour lines, your legs look really 3 dimensional that way. I especially like day 44 drawing of Dorian? aswell as today’s (day 48) figures. 👋

• This reply was modified 3 years, 6 months ago by Christopher.

[Christopher]

Thank you Gordan but these are from 4 days. If I don’t post doesn’t mean I took a break. Since day 1 of challenge 1 I haven’t missed a day yet, I just don’t post it every day 😅

And yes I like figure drawing 😁

Day 43

It’s interesting if I don’t follow along how different all these pages look. Like if four different people drew them 😅

I can’t wait for the assignment aswell as to watch some demonstrations to follow along again. Also I’m curious how my gestures will change while progressing through the course.

• This reply was modified 3 years, 6 months ago by Christopher.
• This reply was modified 3 years, 6 months ago by Christopher.
• This reply was modified 3 years, 6 months ago by Christopher.

[Christopher]

Thank you Mattias,

I just finished the intro part yesterday and started with the gesture lectures today. Following along is difficult without the knowledge but I definitely have to agree that his teaching is crystal clear and he explains his vision on those principles in a way I can relate to.

Day 39, 40, 41 & 42

Not the most productive days in terms of drawing quantity but I went through the whole first chapter of Karl Gnass spirit of the pose course. Most of what you see are follow alongs of his demonstrations since part 1 did not include any assignment. I also filled a few pages of my notebook.

Bottom right figures are from today. I watched the first video of part 2 centered around gesture but since I don’t expect to arrive at the assignment in the next days I tried my own versions with focusing on what he explained, in this case I specifically tried to emphasize the line of action.

[Christopher]

37 & 38

Since that beside Value, developing an overall process was also a goal of mine for this challenge ,which is luckily pretty general in what it could mean, I think adding figure drawing as a subject should be fine.

I picked the spirit of the pose by karl gnass as course to start with. And for this course I’ll try to more closely follow what karl gnass suggests. In the past I often just loosely stuck to the teached principles because I thought understanding the idea behind it would be enough.

I also got a dedicated notebook to take notes, thanks to debra and Deborah for being an inspiration 😅👋

Beside this challenge, I think for future challenges I will just put much more value in just drawing everyday and allow myself to jump around as I like.

As Mattias said, everyone has it’s extreme. So for me I think it’s best to be thankful for the benefits of my analytical and disciplined thinking but to counterbalance it’s negative aspects mentally trying to loosening up a bit and to focus more on just keeping the enjoyment and to draw everyday.

• This reply was modified 3 years, 6 months ago by Christopher.
• This reply was modified 3 years, 6 months ago by Christopher.
• This reply was modified 3 years, 6 months ago by Christopher.

[Christopher]

Thanks alot to both of you Gordan & Mattias 🙏

Both of your comments are really helpful and encouraging. Especially if I combine what you both said I come to the conclusion that at my current stage everything I do is at least of some value even if it might not be what would be of most value at that moment.

Keeping the desire and the dream of learning to draw means to keep going, so even if I would do everything “wrong” I at least did something and therefore moved forward.

I think in the beginning while we aren’t able to communicate with our art as we would like to it’s so easy to lose ourself in just working for the goal instead for the enjoyment of the process which ultimately is why we like doing art.

If we look at being an artist like being a burning flame a beginner might be looked at like a small and weak flame. At that stage it might be more important to be careful and protect the flame from dying than to add new wood to increase it’s size. (I hope that makes sense)

In the future I’ll keep in mind that to keep going and to enjoy the process should be my number one priority right now.

[Christopher]

Day 36

In the moment there a many different thougths wandering through my head like if my focus on value maybe was to early, not necessarily in terms of difficulty but in being not that important in my current stage to stress so much about it.

Also how to reconnect with the fun side of doing art and what is even fun for me. And following those thoughts leading to the question of what actually is more valuable (especially for someone like me), learning the basics through a more academic lense there your current abilities lead to what subjects are appropriate to draw (fruits, objects) or to learn drawing through a subject I like. But what are the downsides of the latter, what basic elements do I maybe not develop enough that way?

Beside all this and to whatever decision all this leads I also don’t want to stop this challenge since I intended to stick to it however it goes but I also agree with some of the comments in both this and the first challenge about me needing to lean less towards clean, emotionless practise and more towards putting the elements together and to actually enjoy what I’m doing. But as silly as it sounds in the moment I got no clue how to do that. 😅

Looking back in my opinion focusing just on a basic fundamental skill and not on an specific subject matter was not the best decision since it let’s someone like me fall into the trap of grinding (in a bad way) and not getting out of my comfort zone just to easily.

• This reply was modified 3 years, 6 months ago by Christopher.
• This reply was modified 3 years, 6 months ago by Christopher.

[Christopher]

Hi Natasha,

I regularly look into here and I really love your work since I’m also a huge fan of watercolor and pen & ink (I would also love to see more lectures here on NMA covering those two topics).

I like the expressiveness of your watercolors and I admire what you already achieved regarding pen & ink work.

Are your portraits done with ballpoint pens, or fineliners?

Oh and I exactly know what you mean with getting impatient 😅 I find it so easy to fall into the trap of getting impatient and just mindlessly hatching to finish what I’m working on.

Do you have specific resources regarding pen & ink and hatching or do you have favorite artist’s to study? I for myself only got the book from Alphonso Dunn which is pretty helpful to get a system into your hatching since he want’s you to think about the purpose of each individual stroke aswell as each layer of strokes.

Keep going, I think you are on a good way 👋

• This reply was modified 3 years, 6 months ago by Christopher.

[Christopher]

Hi Gordan,

I don’t think that I can necessarily help you with your struggles but I wanted to say that you can clearly see the passion, the hard work and the drive to improve in your work aswell as in your written thoughts.

And I can totally relate to constantly questioning your own decisions because of feeling like doing the right thing for one day and then being clueless if what you’re doing is efficient the next few days. It can be a pretty stressful up and down but at least it’s kind of calming for me to see that we all seem to have those kind of thoughts and struggles.

I think in our stages of trying to learn the basics to reach creative freedom persistence and patience are our best friend.

Just keep pushing, I’m sure you’ll get there! 👋

[Christopher]

Hi Mattias,

I think you can clearly see that your gestures payed off. Your tree and object sketches look really loose and gestural.

I just like visiting your thread regularly because I really can relate to your thoughts and struggles.

Even with a goal in mind it’s not easy to get out of our comfort zone isn’t it? At least for me that’s the case 😅

In that regard I’m curious if you already have a specific direction or goal in mind you are working towards. 🤔👋

[Christopher]

Congratulations Erik and yes your comments aswell as your posts were helpful, so thank you 👍🙏

• This reply was modified 3 years, 6 months ago by Christopher.

[Christopher]

Day 34 & 35

Banana days! 😅 I personally like the fountain pen ones from today more.

[Christopher]

Day 32 & 33

Left side is from yesterday and the right side from today. I wanted to throw in some objects from life again and I’m still struggling but hopefully persistence will pay off.

[Christopher]

Hi Erik,

What I’m curious about is than you first started with art and at the point you got your first commissions, were Murals one of your goals or did it randomly evolve over time?

Whatever the answer is I definitely really like your murals and also your other work. 👍👋

• This reply was modified 3 years, 6 months ago by Christopher.

[Christopher]

Day 31

It ended up way more rough and abstract than intended. My brushes are probably a bit to big for how small I’m working right now.

But besides that I really enjoy doing these. The only thing I struggle with is actually starting because I always find myself thinking that the chosen reference is above my current abilities. That’s why I choose more complex references on purpose.

Also the process of doing these really clarified what I need to work on. Proportions is still a thing aswell as value grouping.

• This reply was modified 3 years, 6 months ago by Christopher.
• This reply was modified 3 years, 6 months ago by Christopher.
• This reply was modified 3 years, 6 months ago by Christopher.

[Christopher]

Hi Mattias,

I for my part think that your gestures are way more advanced/solid than you might think yourself. So in my opinion you are at a point there you could progress or attempt to throw in new ingredients.

Just from looking at your work and reading your comments it ,to me, looks like your stuck. A bit similar to how I feel with my practise.

So attempting something different could be what you need to gain new input.

Maybe shift the focus more towards anatomy now. Glenn Vilppu’s lectures could also be helpful since your asked to construct figures from different forms and one form only. Since your technique seems to be really solidified by now this could maybe help to get some new ideas.

Anyway I’ll keep being a fan of your gestures, whatever you do 👋

[Author]

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