January Nude...a study in pastel

January Nude   pastel/paper   19.75 x 8

Our club's first model session of the new year was last Wednesday night.  Although I have stayed away from these sessions for a while, I definitely needed a jump start in the creative department after the long holiday hiatus.  And nudes are usually not my favorite.  Although there is much to be learned about the human body, I find them full of void, and not quite as interesting.  I came prepared with a nice slice of watercolor paper and some pastels from my Yarka sauce collection.  The model provided a wonderful classic pose and extreme concentration.  My thrill comes from the playing with the hard and soft edges....deciding which shapes to sublimate.  With white paper and light warms, I realized that it would be the darks that would lead the eye around the figure.  Originally, the darks were stroky, wild and black.  At home, I softened the darks with a greenish-gray that seemed, to me, more appropriate to the softness of the skin, the pose.  Broken dark reddish-brown line-work was added at the end to play off of the greens.

My friend Greg had a different problem to solve.  He was working on a gray toned paper.  In his case, it was the lights that did the leading.

One pose.  Many possibilities. 

Ah....Middle Age...a profile...

Middle Age   oil/canvas   16 x 8 x 1.5

In our youth- and diet-oriented culture, we seem to cringe at the the notion of middle age.  My work was painted from a detailed sketch made during a live model situation.  There were those who really didn't want to participate, as this gentleman's body veered quite a ways from  the beautiful norm that we admire.  As I have never appreciated or enjoyed the notion of physical perfection, nor likewise the notion of ugliness in order to make a statement, I thoroughly appreciated the opportunity before me.  (I much enjoy the French term jolie-laide, which incorporates a bit of both)  Middle age...the period where gravity takes its toll, where backs laden with fatigue become curved...where support is welcome...where plumpness becomes the norm.  Yes.  I relished the opportunity to reduce this drawing to a few simple shapes and lines that would tell the story of middle age.

P.S.  A simple look around the studio revealed similar bodies, even among those who scoffed.  Life is interesting.

The Art of the Figure....tee hee hee

January Nude   pastel/paper   19.75 x 8

I see the human body as a major miracle, a thing of beauty, and I love to study it. Muscles of dancers and runners thrill me. Postures of musicians titillate. But the jokes associated with life drawing classes (tee hee hee) have never been that funny to me. We are a culture of contrasts: we don't think twice about watching people get "blown away" in movies or in video games; we love to watch intimate details of people treating each other horribly, disregarding kindness and respect, through the lens of reality television; and women with plastic breasts stare at us from magazine racks at every quick-stop across the land. But somehow the nude human body scares us, taints us and could possibly be evil? It is my own humble opinion that things are a bit bass-ackwards here. "The Art of the Figure" exhibit at Peninsula Art Academy will be shown through October 17. Will all school children who view the exhibit be forever tainted? I think not. I hope for "forever inspired".