Exercise 3 Tonal Figure Study

Natural light for the first two sketches.
1. Conte crayon. This was meant to a very simplified sketch using cylindrical forms. Although I was aware of this from the start somehow I could not resist adding tonal areas whever the opportunity presented itself. The forms looked rounded and cylindrical even prior to adding shadows and I was pleased with the proportions and angles.
2. Pencil. The model's back is too long relative to other areas ie. the head and lower body. The feet were stretched out although I couldn't see any obvious faults in my own interpretation. However, the right foot appears to be an odd shape and does not look like a normal human foot to me.
3. Artificial and natural light from right. Charcoal on green paper. A lot of foreshortening in this one. I like the angle here - interesting. I think the hands look pretty convincing too. But, because I'm not happy with the way I did the hair and face - umm.. it is not a candidate for painting.

1

4. Conte crayon - black. Similar angle to no.1. This is a close second to no.1. I ran out of room for the left foot. Even so the legs look too short and the body too wide. I do like the way the fabric folds on the shorts and the shape of the shadows to the left of the back.

3

The Picasso in the course manual and Mainie Jelett's Seated Nude are similar to what I would aspire to - both in a cubist style. Simplified but semi-abstract appeal.

2

4

Tonal Study - Painting
Under painting muted green
Tried some samples of colours on a test piece with the same green background. Ended up mixing multiple colours and tones from just ultramarine, cadmium red, cadmium yellow and white. During the process I began to realize I should try cut the mixes down a little. I did most of the painting from the sketches (no.s 1 and 4) and a couple of photos. Although the model was quite patient, I didn't want to ask him to keep still for the whole painting aswell (on and off). Applying the paint didn't take a huge amount of time - three to four hours, but I struggled in the early stages with the tones, even though I previously thought I had them worked out. If I had limited the palette a bit more it would have been easier. Interestingly I found the tones easier to blend (so as to soften some edges) after about three hours or so.
Summary On the whole, I am quite pleased with the outcome of this painting.  I find the whole colour combination,  the surrounding elements and space, with the flesh colours and tones, quite appealing despite my struggle with the flesh tones. I like the horizontal movement from lower left to upper right and I think I succeeded with the foreshortening on this occasion. In the main the brushwork appears to have more interesting qualities when compared to most of my other paintings from this part of the course, which all came later..

Tonal study