Art Museum

The demographic of the students where I teach is drawn from young people who are obsessed by:
VFX driven movies, comic books, and video games.
The majority of them have no interest or knowledge of Art History.
Some know a few artists names but only the ones that are Ninja Turtles.
Many of them have never set foot inside an art museum.
Its my job to take them there.
 I give them the basic tour and talk about the various periods and artists.
Then they have to study and draw some of the art.
It's an invaluable lesson from the past.
 I always try and knock out a few sketchbook drawings while I’m there.
Here’s a couple from the other day.
 I block them out quick and then increase contrast and selective details. 
(I have a lot of drawings I do at various museums and may put more up later.)

Bust of Pope XXI 10'' x 8''

Rodin - Thinker - 10'' x 8 ''

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A few more figure models.

 A few figure models came down to pose for the drawing bootcamp class this past week.
I’m teaching the students to understand proportion and anatomy from various views.
Some of them find it challenging when they can't see the models face and frontal anatomical landmarks.
You use the same principles of drawing in any pose the model takes.
 Proportion, value, anatomy, and basic hand eye coordination
 Here are a few more demo’s from class.

20 minute drawings. (Quick & dirty.)
 Models curtsey of: The Bay Area Models Guild.

Koyote's Back 17'' x 12''

Carrie's Back 17''  X 12''

Koyote's Back Again 16'' x 12''

Carries Back Again 17" x 12"

Some Recent Figue Drawings.

  I knocked out a pencil portrait of the figure model as a demo in class the other day.
Basic principles of drawing what you see. How to hold the pencil & then: structure, form, value, anatomy.
20 minutes (quick & dirty.)

Wendell 18'' x 12''

Here's a couple more 20 minute life drawing demos from last week.

Models curtsey of: " The Bay Area Models Guild."

Dread Locks 18'' x 12"

Jennings Back  15'' x 11''

Figure drawing- measuring proportion & value demos.

With the new term ramping up, I had the first figure model come in for the drawing bootcamp class.
On the first figure drawing day I have the students draw the model head to toe for 20 minutes with no prior explanation or instruction.
 What I hope to see is everyone drawing expertly and have my job made easier.

20 min. figure proportion demo 20" x 14"

But, most of the time the beginning student drawings are badly proportioned and sometimes barely resemble the human form.
So, I’ll have to do a 20 minute figure drawing demo while explaining measuring, head count, plumb & level lines,
triangulation, anatomy, value, etc.
Here’s the demo from the other day with measuring lines visible.
Here’s a couple more quick demos from the same day on how to draw with white charcoal on dark paper and how to use pencil and white charcoal on middle grey/blue toned paper.

Portrait - 14" x 11" quick demo white on dark.

Seated figure - 14" x 11" quick demo pencil & white on middle grey

Apple & Pear demos

 The Apple & Pear demos from the other day in drawing class.
How to draw what you see
Basic drawing principles.
Light to dark values, form shadow, cast shadow, positive/negative space, etc.
Routine boring stuff but useful.
( Drawn in about 15 minutes, quick& dirty.)

Apple. 18" x 14"

Pear. - 18" x 14"

Sketch Concept Heaps

                         Sketchy

  I sketch pages like this quite a bit.
They generally start out aimlessly while I’m preoccupied with something
else. (In a meeting, on the phone, tired, bored, etc…)
They get drawn without thinking too much (or too little.)
This type of drawing isn’t really what I would consider to be “serious art.”
All the same, sometimes characters and ideas show up that you weren’t expecting.

When I  teach concept art I encourage the students to aimlessly scribble and scrawl as much as possible.

These Two Guys showed up earlier today while I was teaching students how to draw realistic objects like apples and pears.

Random Character/Creature/Faces ... Heap

Random Character/Creature Sketch Heap

Random Character/Creature Sketch Heap

Random Rough Sketch Dump

Zoo Drawing - Another Thorny Stick...

 I pulled a book off my shelf today and this little insect sketch fell out.
Another thorny walking stick from a zoo field trip last year.

 Once again a quick rough.
I actually like the fast spontaneous drawings better than the slower labored ones.

Zoo Drawing - New Guinea Walking Stick.

 I’m currently teaching a basic drawing class 
“ Drawing Bootcamp” for computer kids at the local Digital College.
I took them on a field trip to the Zoo to
draw live animals today.
Knocked out a quick pencil rough of a walking stick.
The sketch could have been better/quicker but
I had a hangnail that was bothering me.
 Studying the“real”is essential for every form of Art… 
 

Insect elements are always a good ingredient to throw into concept creature designs. 

Random - Creature Concept - Abadon.

Randomness means different things in various fields. You know there is something out there but you don't know where to look.