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| 9/11/18 Arboretum |
My Gage instructor Suzanne Brooker (whom
I studied colored pencil and graphite with) offered some of her current
and former private students a mini-course this fall in sketching on location.
Unlike all other location sketching classes I’ve taken, this one doesn’t focus
on making completed drawings. The sole purpose of these sketches is for what
she calls visual thinking – a method for
taking visual notes that will be informative when we refer to them back at the studio
to make finished drawings using photo references.
Since I don’t make finished drawings “back
at the studio,” my main motivation for taking the class is to continue learning
from Suzanne – but this time in the field instead of using photos. (I kept my
fingers crossed that September’s weather would stay hospitable, and so far it
has been beautiful.) We’ve been meeting weekly at the Washington Park Arboretum, where she has found much subject matter
for her own work. Very familiar with the park, she has taken us to her favorite
spots and shared some of her vast knowledge of trees.
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| 9/25/18 Arboretum |
Having just completed Kathleen Moore’s
course in Drawing Nature, in which
Kathleen strongly emphasized making thumbnails as a tool for developing
drawings, I was pleased by how well the two instructors’ reasoning reinforced
each other. While Kathleen encouraged us to spend no more than a few minutes on
a small thumbnail to design the composition and understand the values, Suzanne
takes a little more time to develop a small sketch, but the intention is the
same: Explore a composition and take note of the values.
Composition and values. Composition
and values. Composition and values. These are the most important elements in
any drawing or painting (at least those based on realism). Did I mention
composition and values? (I’m repeating these mantras so I won’t forget!)
Because we aren’t taking the time to
complete sketches on the spot, Suzanne’s class has been somewhat frustrating to
me – I find myself automatically working furiously to finish sketches in my usual
way and sometimes missing the point of visual notetaking. But I thoroughly
appreciate the opportunity to see how she looks at a given view – for example,
a densely packed mass of trees and foliage that just looks like a huge mess of
green to me – and designs a composition based on some part of it. Seeing her
small sketches that result from that mess of green gives me a glimpse of what
she’s thinking about. Visual thinking.
It’s both informative and fascinating.
Shown here are a few examples of my
visual thoughts. Yes, the thoughts have been as muddled as the sketches, but I’m
working on better clarity in both.
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| Here's what I saw... |
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| ... and here's what I was thinking about when I saw it. The mind is a messy place to look. |
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