Improvement

One of my biggest weaknesses in drawing is... life drawing. The human figure. I've only had ONE life drawing session in my life, and that was what, 5 years ago already? One of my drawing classes at art school included a day where a nude model came in and we drew her in various poses for a couple hours. I remember alternating between pencil, charcoal, and ink drawings. I think my charcoal ones turned out best because of the ease to shade. We also took a trip to the Minneapolis Institute of Arts for a class one day too, and had to draw a Rodin sculpture, which you can see below. Keep in mind, this is from FIVE years ago, and I don't think I'd show much improvement if I tried drawing something like that again today.

(my Rodin study, circa November 2000)

I know, I could be drawing fully-clothed people on any given day (AND I SHOULD BE DOING THIS), but for some reason I never do! That needs to change. I need to get back into the figure drawing BIGTIME.

It's sort of ironic because I draw caricatures as my primary job right now, which has helped me become very familiar with the human face, even if I draw them in a cartoony fashion. But even with caricatures, I rarely draw full bodies - most of the time it's shoulders and upper chests. Is it because part of me is nervous to draw full bodies? Why yes, it is! I mean, if I HAVE to draw a body, I CAN, and it's not CRAP or anything, but it never looks magnificent either.

Even with cartoon characters, I've ONLY begun concentrating more on their entire bodies rather than just their heads. I've always been able to draw the head fine, but I start getting confused and VERY frustrated when an arm or hand, leg or foot looks very incorrect! And trust me, this occurs REGULARLY. I hate it.

I see they have plenty of life-drawing references online, and you can even download hi-res images of nude models in virtually any pose you want... so maybe I'll try those. But I'd REALLY like to be in the classroom doing this instead. It's live, as you have the benefit of a living, breathing human being, rather than just a photograph to work off of. It's just better that way, isn't it? So we'll see. I live in a small town, but if I could find out about some classes in Fargo or even Minneapolis, I'd be willing to enroll.

I know it's practice, practice, practice. And observation. And all that other stuff that I've learned as an artist all these years. I will say that I AM drawing more stuff NOW than I ever was while at art school (not even counting the work I do with caricatures), because I've become more motivated as of late. So if I keep up the motivation and stay inspired, I'm sure I'll see the results. After all, my boss/mentor James Hungaski (check out his stuff!), who is a brilliant artist and caricaturist in his own right (and who has also worked with MAD Magazine's Tom Richmond), has seen my improvements as an artist since I started doing caricatures last summer. And that's been a huge motivation right there. Now let's hope I can see some good results with my upcoming comic book!

Yes, and I also promise to post some of my caricatures on here eventually!