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| 10/12/17 Green Lake (in progress) |
My latest graphite class assignment is shown above (still
in progress; there’s a bush in the left foreground that’s especially
challenging, so I’m going to ask my instructor for help before I tackle it). I
must say I enjoy drawing trees much more than clouds or rocky shorelines.
And I’m enjoying this week’s homework a lot more than the past weeks’
assignments for other reasons: I’m very familiar with the location (Green
Lake), and I took the reference photo myself.
Even though making the drawing is no less challenging
with a familiar landscape, it somehow makes a difference to know and understand
which way the shoreline is curving, how far away those trees are from the shore
where I stood when I took the photo, the time of day and year – things like
that.
I think it has to do with resonance – how meaningful the subject matter of a drawing is and
how that affects its outcome. I talked about resonance a few years ago and how discovering urban sketching finally
made drawing “stick” as a habit. Of course, sometimes a trash bin is just a trash bin, and the subject matter doesn’t have to resonate meaningfully to turn
into a sketch. (If you read my blog regularly, then you know that my standards
for what makes an object sketch-worthy are certainly low.) But a photo of a landscape
is already once-removed from the actual location, and a photo of a place I’ve
never seen with my own eyes is even further removed. No wonder there’s no
resonance at all.
Lovely sketch and a good insight. I'm most attracted to outdoor subjects, especially landscapes, and during the cold/rainy months I've tried drawing from photos but as you say, if it's not my own photo or a very familiar place, I'm just not that interested and the sketch will suffer. I definitely want to be engaged with whatever subject I'm trying to render.
ReplyDeleteI think it is much easier to connect with a photo you took yourself. I think it is because you've been there and can feel some of what you felt and remember. Good luck with the rest of the drawing.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Joan. It's easier to connect with a photo that I took myself. Just the fact that I can try to remember the light, the feeling, the vibe...everything around me when I took the photo helps me to draw and paint better.
ReplyDeleteThanks for your comments, Alex, Joan and Ching! A photo we take ourselves is better than nothing, but as well we all know, real life is best!
ReplyDelete