Process, #1

The first two images were scanned before I had recovered the software necessary to calibrate scans.  They are much too washed out.

at 2.5 hours

at 4.5 hours

The progress scan below was made tonight, adjusting the DPI,  brightness, and contrast.

This is my dear, beloved, cherished friend Jesseca Trainham - muse, teacher, healer, confidant fellow artist, and fellow spiritual wanderer. 

Given what I said about the elements that ahve in the past shorted out my mental process, imagine what it's taking to map out the stitching in Jesseca's hat!  It takes a lot to psych myself up for the next session.  Fortunately I have not just a printed photo but also the same photo on the computer - obviously more luminous for the screen, and it's a nice big resolution so I can zoom in.  I need to correct some stitching, and correct the cloth  past the buckle on her hat - a detail the printed photo did not yield to me an was revealed only on the computer copy.

This is a current project, on medium drawing paper, 8x10.  As you can see by comparing to the drawing of Dana Cooper, this paper does not allow the smooth shading I prefer afforded me by the cardstock.  The tradeoff is that this paper is much more durable and will hold up to more intensive shading with the harsh point of a mechanical pencil.  I can get  good contrasts with both papers, but risk  tearing the shit out of the cardstock surface!  I can also erase more cleanly on the drawing paper.  I've another tablet of drawing paper.  At this point I'm just trying out grades of paper to see what I like best.

Here is a closeup so that you can see the pencil strokes, tace how the image is developing.:

Resources

Look for your resources everywhere.  By resources I mean everything that gets you there - inspiration, raw material, anything that helps put you in the zone.  Seriously, I'm half tempted to enroll in some night school classes just to recapture the environment in which I had my greatest advances.

Ideally, you should have a retreat.  Don't scoff, that's an invaluable resource!  Some quiet place that puts you at ease from stress, whatever works for you.  A friend of mine has The Grotto, an religious idyll.  It's quite beautiful there.  Me, I have no place like that.  It's one thing having to deal with personal stressors...it's another thing to be in a situation wherein you're not being allowed to deal with anything, not given the space you need to cope or work things out.  Putting it mildly...it's not conducive to work.

Legos blocks!  I have four siblings, they have kids, their kids have kids.  That mean there are always Legos around!  Not only are they still fun to build with, they are also a nice way to frame and support physical builds of all sizes and shapes.

Noted before, I'm running out of Woodsies - those thin dowels.  I can't get them in bulk from Amazon, and there I have to pay shipping - adding two or three times the cost of a bag off the shelf at Michael's!   Stirring sticks for coffee, OTOH, are free and available just about anywhere.  I'll be going over the whole thing with putty anyway, all I need do is fill in the structure.  That empty space in the center, that's where the dining room goes.

Kind of a "no duh", but the internet really is an endless resource.  It's getting me to put my stuff out there...or rather, it's getting me to make some stuff to put out there.  Next week I'll be meeting someone to talk about a drawing.  Through the local library's online catalog I can get books on all subjects for free, or order what I need.  The two art stores in my neighborhood that carried 0.3mm lead both closed, but Amazon has it which saves a busride downtown.  My scanner is almost capturing my drawings right again, now that I've dowwnloaded software to replace the old.

It's good for bumper-sticker inspirational thinking too.  These are hitting me lately:

So.  Flash drives are good too, as long as you keep track of them.  I saved a bunch of good stuiff to flash drive recently...and promptly lost the thing.  There was a progress collage I had of a drawing of Dana that I started a few years ago. It contained nine or ten scans of the drawing, each one two hours further along.  I can't find that image anywhere now.  Shame, it was  great illustration of my process.

As mentioned in an earlier post, my scanner washes out much of my pencil shading.  I've re-installed software to manage the scans, but it's limited to adjusting brightness and contrast...the image is closer to what I've drawn but the subtleties are still not there.

Dana Cooper

This is smaller than actual size, on  8.5 x 11 cardstock.

Also as noted before, I've encountered some difficulty finishing the drawing.  I was just then trying to get back into drawing, and I made some mistakes.  One, I didn't think to use a barrier between my hand/arm and the paper, so the edges have yellowed.  Some of that I can crop, and it will be okay though it does throw off the composition: the relationship between Dana and the space surrounding her.   It's not inappropriate...I think sometimes the world does close in around her, and once that was my own fault.  I'm sorry, Dana.

The yellowing on the right edge is too heavy to be removed, and I can only hope to disguise it with heavy shading.  Then again, I was never sure what to do about a background as the only light areas of the original photograph are her skin.  It's very striking, and was my original choice, but I love the flowing shapes that frame the bottom contours of the drawing.  So, unmarked space at the bottom...but that doesn't work well for her hair.  Her hair, that's where I have trouble...it's a small photo and the shapes in her hair are too difficult for me to map out. So I'm having to roughly recreate...ahm...not a duplication of what I see but the essence of it.  Block the rest of it in as you see  on the left, get a general placement of flow, then start darkening it.  At some point I have to put away the photo and see what the drawing itself needs in order to look alive.  it's  incredibly difficult to psych myself up to this aspect of this particular drawing. it's one reason progress has been so slow, added to the other technical aspect which was discouraging.

This is on cardstock.  Another difficult drawing I'm doing is on a page from a drawing tablet.  I'm finding that I vastly prefer the cardstock for it's smoother texture which captures my shading better, but that the drawing paper is less prone to tearing when I get heavy with that fine tip.  I am needing to experiment with using wider gauges of lead for heavy shading.

You'll have noticed that the shaded area of the background looks out of place.  That's because it was shaded with a  regular #2 pencil, and is only temp work.  If necessary I'll erase it before using a mechanical pencil, but I;m hoping instead to use the mechanical to supplement the regular pencil.  It's an experiment, I'm hoping to arrive at a look that looks integral to the texture of the whole but still sets it apart slightly from the rest.
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Laurie from Nike

This is the kind of texture I'd like to develop for hair.  I like this look a lot.  No contours, pure shape!  Very dynamic, lively.  

Lori Hamilton

Similar to the roadblock I faced with hair, I got hung up on every stitch on Lori's sweater having to be exactly right.   She doesn't entirely look herself in this photo, taken by someone else.  Pro photographer, I believe she said, Lori was posing for him at the beach.  The wind was blowing the sand into her eyes!

Putty in Your Hands

Just to demonstrate that I really am working on things, here's an update with one or more pics.  All stuff I'm taking my time on, it's getting easier.  I gave up sodas this month, and am finding a little more...what is it, drive?  Or is my ability to visualize a way forward loosening up?  I'm making progress now on things that used to leave me discouraged. 

And let me just say...I fuckin' love Woodsies!

The armature above is not set to an exact scale, being rather exaggerated in proportions, but close to 1/10th.  It is also not following any of the paper models I have built for copying shapes, but then again it's only one of several attempts I'm taking at sculpting the human form, all of them from a different angle. The models are mostly male fantasy exaggerations (hey, I didn't design them!)  , some anime-based, and a few that are more realistic - my personal leaning is to the more natural, so as I choose which ones to copy I'll be modifying the proportions.  This particular sculpt is based on an anime styled drawing. 

 I'm using 22 caliber floral wire from Michael's, binding Woodsies (see the thin wooden dowels?) to the armature with copper wire.  Aleene's Quick-Dry Tacky Glue to make them, er, tacky for the clay  Premo Sculpy) to stick to.  The  core of the trunk is bulked in with foil so the body is flexible for posing.  I needed to make the legs longer as she'll be wearing spike heel, but that's a good lesson - easily solvable when I get that far.  I'm using Sarah Simblet's book Anatomy for th Artist as a reference: indispensable book, must buy myself  a copy in hardback (it's running around thirty dollars used on Amazon last I looked).

I spent a few days drawing, and the works I chose are among the harder to deal with.  That was a mistake for trying to get into the zone and stay there.   It was too easy to retreat to other projects where translating tonal shifts from my vision to my hand wasn't the work needed.  So I'm going to choose one of the easier pieces I've prepared and go with those.  Those are less personal, but will be rewarding all the same. 

Must remember to find the manual for the scanner/printer...it picks up ink sketches well enough but not fine pencil shadings.  At the moment I cannot share what I finish. 

One of those drawing challenges has a tangle of fine details that have to be mapped out.  Lucky for me I have it as a large file on my computer, because the printed copy simply is';t as luminous as I need it to be and it had me on the wrong path.  One major detail must now be corrected...or just faked.    The other is a drawing based on a wallet-sized photo that was very dark when it was new, and it ain't so new now thirty years later. When I try to map out her hair visually it makes my eyes dizzy.  So...I'm blocking it in roughly, then at some point I'll have to set the photo aside and just see what the drawing itself demands in order to look integral.  That image has other obstacles, at least one of which is my own doing in trying to get back into it. 

Want to do some pen and ink but at the moment no imaged are coming to mind.

Oil paints, I have a dual image in mind but they need figuring out.  Monochromatic, primarily, one in red and one in blue.  Not my happiest stuff.

Bet ya don't know what this is:

 Yeah, didn't think so!  maybe you'll do better with this:

Waddya think, do ya know that one?  I'm using cardstock and Woodsies for the basic shapes, and will go over them  later with epoxy putty.  There's nothing else for the details I'll have to add, plus the versatility and strength it provides.  That would have been my medium of choice all these years, I'm good with the stuff.  Sadly, it's not good with me.  Found out long ago that I'm one of a rare few who are allergic to the chemicals in it.  I'm fine as long as I wear protective gloves, but they get in the way of shaping it, either too loose or too constrictive, and I can't  I can't feel the material through them.  Worse, I can't help absent-mindedly wiping at my face, scratching at itches, etc...and what this shit does to my skin, damn.  Eyes puff out and water, mouth dries to the point of cracking and bleeding.

Here, here's an easy one.

That one I know you recognized right away.

So it's two in the morning, listless night like last night, and today was a Reverse Midas: everything I touch turns to shit, nothing to do but ride it out.  Got a book to finish and return to the library, maybe I'll wait 'til I've slept before starting in on anything.  Weekend coming, my friend may want someone to vent to or commiserate with. 


Ooooh!  I wonder if I can buy Woodsies in bulk off Amazon?   I'm almost out of all sorts of supplies, musytmake a run to Michael's soon, and the wethaer is getting hot again.

Viedeodwome

There's TMI in Attics

(If you feel awkward about getting personal, or if you happen to be a member of my family, you would do best to exit now.)

Here's another typical artists' concern (there I go again, calling myself an artist. Still don't think I've earned it yet.). Is it editing or self-censorship?

I've already engaged in it my first night out. That debut post read that I'm seeking solace for a broken heart but then I changed it to “depression”. There's a delicate balanced to be maintained. Audiences want to connect on a personal level, but there's a risk of causing them to b uncomfortable with the things that are painful or boring them by being hopelessly miserable. Thing is, one of the reasons this blog exists is as a relief valve. I also hope she'll read it at some point – 'her' being my alienated friend. That's not an easy juggle. Communication has been the biggest issue of my life. I am not broken, but I am brokenhearted.

* * * * * * * * *

When I was little I was forbidden access to the attic over the garage the longest time. I can no longer recall what fascinated me at first when I was finally allowed up. Boxes of this or that, old photos maybe. At first it was good just to gain entry to a place that had once been forbidden. That's a drive, for me...in Vallejo just outside of San Fransisco we'd lived at the edge of a desert. You couldn't see it from my backyard, as the yard ended with a rise that blocked the expanse from view. I was never allowed to climb that incline but I kept trying. I was maybe thee years old. One time I fell in the attempt and my face came down on the rake, causing a cut to my nose and nearly putting out an eye. It didn't matter how often I was told there was nothing there for me, the thing was to find out for myself.

Later I would find adult magazines up there. Playboy, Penthouse, Oui. The first thing that struck me was how innocent and playful a lot of it was. That's my first impression of sex, with the tease of primetime TV of the '70s with sitcoms teasing nudist camp plotlines or dramas like Room 222 talking about gays and discrimination...I just...didn't get the hangups. They still baffle me today. I've developed a natural love of human sexuality and a fascination for the prejudices that failed to instill themselves in me.

Why do I relate this? It's a pivotal influence. It's one of the things I would like to be known for in my work if not my self. Sexuality itself, the female body and face, yes, and a visual aesthetic...I remember a Playboy pictorial on the lingerie of the 19^th Century that was wonderful for it's baroque textures and interplay with the body. More than that, though, the values it re-enforced in me and my view of this vitally integral aspect of the human condition. Humanism, love, passion, empathy, compassion, trust. I may find my way to producing that, I may not. We'll have to see where it takes me. I will have to be careful with self-censorship as well, and know that by sharing my values I may lose some of the friends who will not want to accompany me there.

In my last year of high school, with no plan what to do with my life, I seriously considered looking for work in porn as an editor. With my body there was no consideration of performing, and I'm no good with a camera. Editing I think I'd be good at, given enough training. In time I might have directed. Not a lot of people would have back me on that call, but I should have done it. If you ever find yourself denigrating people in porn simply because they are involved in adult movies, that's who you're looking down on: just anybody, just regular people like me.

* * * * * * * * *

We each find our own voice. I've always wished that I weren't so damn literal. I remember in 1^st or 2^nd grade, we were given an assignment that writing about what we would daydream sitting on the back porch. We were also to draw that scene in crayon. I was the one who drew a picture of myself sitting on a porch.

Surely communication has to be more than that.

How do I draw the smell of a hot attic in Summer? How do I visually put across the potent memory - the heady brew of dry air, cooked dusty webs, the rich aroma of old magazines, the scents of hot skin and sweat and cum? How do I covey the sense of discovery, of...of vindication, I think I felt, in finding this celebration of humanity as a sensual treasure not to be shunned or vilified but explored and understood, and nurtured?

Maintaining a New Balance

No images to share tonight, but there should be something soon. Give it a few days, if it's a sketch. Longer if a drawing.

* * * * * * * * *

I once met a Laurie who worked at Nike (she teased me for wearing a competitor's brand). This was in a life drawing class. I've known Lauries and Lores and Loris...and while I'm not certain that Laurie from Nike spelled her name that way, Lori and I decided from the photo that she looked like a Laurie.

I started that drawing, too, but got the space relationship of her pose wrong. Obsession with perfection, check.

That photo is tonight one in a file of photos I want to draw in the near future. Yes, still just copying other people's photos, but at least that's a personal one. Though I question the artistic merit involved, now isn't the time to fret over it. Lemme just get there again first.

I spent some time compiling that file and making preliminary marks on paper for placing my subjects. I'm nearly there, but it's three in the morning and I'm dead tired. Need to sleep. Today, most;ly I fought with placing a pair of eyes in a clay sculpture of a head, roughly 1/5^th scale. I've attempted sculpts before, but always the body. The results were like some mad scientists nightmarish rejects. This is my first head. I've amassed a number of paper models of figures for physical references of shapes to copy, and I've a book on anatomy that I hope will help. But I struggled today because that “nearly' 1/5^th wasn't nearly enough that the eyes I baked were large enough. Still, she does look...humanoid. Eerie, even, if she were a real person you'd stare and her with a chill down your spine trying to figure out what's so freakin' creepy about her eyes. They're just too small, that's all, and makes not place correctly wherever I situate them.

I also did a little work on a scale replica of a vehicle from an old science fiction Tv show. I've always wanted one and I like the idea of making my own from scratch. I'm using thin wooden dowels, cardstock, and balsa strips. Early stages, still just starting the structure. I don't have blueprints that are complete or accurate. Not a huge problem.

All of which is to say...well, hell. It takes less energy to do all of that than to sit down and draw. It's energy I didn't have today. I suppose mostly it's mental or psychological reserve I'm talking about.

There's a woman I have been wanting to reconnect with for the longest time. She means the world to me. I've been posting on Facebook since earlier this year hoping it would lead us to each other. Almost three weeks ago I sent her a friend request. I did get a response, sort of...she nuked her FB page. I can imagine reasons why that might not mean “go die”, like just making sure she has the space to process my suddenly appearing again...but that's ten percent hope and ninety percent recognizing that she's gone, and it's over. And...I'm doing what I can to deal with it. The wound doesn't heal, I can only keep the pain at bay.

The work can do that for hours at a time. I have good days, I can laugh with friends. I am not broken, but I am heartbroken and the idea of putting on a clown show pretending everything's peachy is loathsome to me. I can't vent on FB, no one there wants to hear it. It's drama. You didn't ask for it either but (a) it's apropos to the subject and (b) it's my fuckin' page!

I mean...that's kinda the point of the whole blog, not just resurrect myself but to stay sane.  And, maybe, give a little look at the process.  Dealing with emotional shit is part of it in a number of ways.  It can sap your energy (damn, does it ever do that for me!), but if you can find your way to the zone the work feeds you and helps to heal.  The more expressive artists find that emotional lows guide their choices.

So the only thing to do is to “Just do it”. Get on with it. That's what artists do. Don't think about it. Don't keep putting obstacles in your own path, don't complicate it. Don't obsess the details to the point it's impossible to continue. Just do it.

* * * * * * * * *

I will have images to post, soon enough, but I've decided that it's a bad move to rush a drawing or a sketch just to have something to post. There's a strong chance a commission is coming my way very soon, in which case everything else will be taking a lower priority. I'm ready for the challenge, I've bought plenty of 0.3mm 2B lead refills, will have to see what size drawing paper is needed (a break in the heat is expected this weekend so a run to Michael's is in the offing).

Carole Ann Ford

This is the sketch mentioned in the previous post. Carole Ann Ford of Doctor Who fame (Susan was the Doctor's granddaughter).  What makes ballpoint pen a good lesson is that every mark remains, including the mistakes.

I never used to be good at hands, but I've really taken a  liking to portraits that incorporate them.  It's so much more expressive.

I also like the line formed by her wrists across the bottom of the image.  Composition is another aspect I struggle with - I've seldom attempted scenes, only primary subjects.

Void Where Prohibited

The idea is that if you create a space you will feel compelled to fill it. Perfectly good theory, not a thing wrong with it. I think even my ascetic friend Scott, who wanted to join a monastery, does this: though he feels most whole with an absence of property, he fills his living space wall to wall with mystery. For most people the theory probably works in some fashion. Give a collector a cabinet and watch what happens.

It's not unknown to trouble artists, though. I have a bunch of notebooks, sketch pads, drawing tablets, even a few canvases bought over the years that are still waiting. It's a pretty vicious fucking block. For me it began with homework back in high school. I paid attention, I aced the tests, but set me down to a blank sheet of notebook paper and it becomes a staring contest that the blank page always wins. You're supposed to transform the sheet with the inner stuffings of your brain. Works the other way for me, run an x-ray on my head and you'll see ruled blue lines.

The problem is two-fold (at the very least). First, I have no idea what to communicate. Or, in the instance of my drawings, I do know what to communicate but not how to turn it into images. Simply, I trained myself as a photorealist and trapped myself by becoming dependent on photographs for my best work. Artist's trap: accept that most of your work will not be your best, you must free yourself to play around. I've occasionally come up with ideas that thrill me for about two minutes until I realize just how facile they are. Visual junk food. Bumper sticker art.

Second: who says doing art has to communicate a message? That's academia, not creation. What I have to show is a love for my subject, and if I do well that should speak to someone. Scott and I were at the grotto today, looking at the religious sculptures. He couldn't communicate to me just why none of them really spoke to him, and the only answer he could give when I asked what would make him happy he said, essentially, “something that makes me feel what these don't”. he needs something that strikes a spiritual chord...as an atheist, I was looking at the artistry and found some of the pieces beautiful. (that's another lesson, BTW, no piece will strike a chord with everyone.)

Basically, I'm stumbling over the idea of art instead of making it. Just make something, that's art. Not necessarily good art, usually not, but art all the same. It doesn't have to be anything.

Third (wait, wasn't that supposed to be only two problems?): perfectionism. After school the problem with my homework seeped into my drawings, exclusively portrait work by then. Can you imagine trying to get every hair in a photograph mapped out on a drawing? But if I didn't, I got frustrated and too unhappy with the work to finish it. I'm still struggling with that. I have no solution to offer, at least not yet, but I do have a tentative fix to suggest to anyone in the same circumstance. Lay off the drawing for a while, and do some sketches – but do it in another medium. At first I had a bias against sketches, they would seem inherently of less worth than a meticulously crafted piece. Once I did one, though, I was struck by how much I liked the vitality of it. My drawings are done in mechanical pencil, .3mm most of them. I did the sketch in ball point pen. You can't erase anything with a pen, and you can't get every fine line. You simply can't, not if it's truly a sketch. Even a sketch can take me all night.

Fourth: depression. Was my depression caused by my block or was it the other way around? I don't know, but I think it's the only way out. OTOH, my depression flares up irregularly from another source, one that I have not been able to surmount. Someone missing from my life but not my soul, a misunderstanding never corrected, a wound that can't heal. But that's another story...anyway, I feel better when I'm working on a project, and I have so many to work on! Working – well, it hasn't outright healed me but it takes blots out the pain for a while.

**********************

Okay, so, as of tonight I haven't yet done another new image to post.  Still, to give this blog a little legitimacy and to show you what I'm talking about, I'll post a few older pieces.  Apologies to the few people who know me, they've seen these already.  Thing is, I'm working in 3D media at the mo', switching back to 2D takes psyching into and I want to get something more substantial posted.

 This is what I do at my best.  See the hair?  I got lost in the hair.  How thick is a hair?  But I had to have each one - nad not a contour line, either, but the shine of each one charted.  It shut me down fast.  

That was done with a .3mm mechanical pencil.  That thinness of lead does not lend a side to shade with, it's all point.  That takes a while to get anywhere.  A small drawing can take a week, and my eyesight gives me  two hours working time before risking an eyestrain headache.  This one is larger, but done back in the mid/late '80s. just before the block took me whole.

Josephine Baker, unfinished ballpoint pen sketch on regular typing paper. Recent.  Now, this was supposed to be just a sketch to test the state of my mojo, which is why it didn't get more respectable paper...but I really like the style that came about for this.  I want to do more like this!  Somewhere around here I've got one of Carole Ann Ford that's really nice - I hope I can find it on one of my flash drives so I don't have to scan it again. 

This is something I'm still exploring, the idea of leaving a a piece partially finished.  I need to get her other earring and the necklaces, but what about her headscarf?  Will that detract from the emphasis on her face?  There's something about leaving an area where the process is more obvious that I think invites people to look deeper, to see what's behind the work.

This is primarily an exercize to discover how well rain can be done in ballpoint pen.  Again, typing paper (accounting for the unanticiparted wrinkles in he shirt, my bad).  the woman is asuka Kurosawa as Rinko, a pivotal (and amazing) scene from Shinya Tsukamoto's film A Snake of June.  As I wanted to display it on sites that were iffy about nudity, and the only place in the scene where she still has clothing is the beginning of the sequence - thus her hair is still not slicked down at this point.  That perhaps detracts from the image being convincing - at leqast, I'm not happy with that particular detail.  I'll try another at some point from the same scene (so many shots to choose from...)

You'll notice that none of these are from my own photography.  That's another problem to grapple with...I couldn't sell any of this, strictly speaking it's not my work.  The images already existed.  This is craft...is it art if it isn't mine?  I'm comfortable with it as long as I'm still only learning, but...that's another post, and it's one I don't know enough about to write.

Here, let me show you those last two agian blown up so that you can see the how the ballpoint works:

Hello.

This blog is an experiment in resurrection.  It will probably be at times NSFW - not photographically but in content.  I am trying to find my way back to "the zone" on a regular basis, overcome artistic blocks.  It is also therapy for depression..

Posts pending.  Like me.  I live in Portland Oregon and my name is Jeff Larsen (no, the other one).  "I am an artist".  No, I'm not quoting someone, the parentheses indicate that I don't have the slightest idea what it means to be an artist, though people keep telling me I am one.  I find the claim highly suspect.

Have patience, please, as of yet I have nothing to show.  Whatever I had I gave away.

Ahem.  Hey, be kind, it's a first attempt.  I've just read a few Austin Kleon books to try to jumpstart me.