My own responses to the comments are in blue Italics.
Thank you for submitting assignment 3 for Drawing 1. It is clear that you have worked hard on this assignment despite its difficulties and that your research and learning log backs up your studies well, however, at times, although you have an acute awareness of this, the work tightens and then loosens around your confidence.
It is true that my work has suffered during this assignment owing to issues with confidence.
I would suggest that you try to look when you can at work in its physical sense to see and understand the many different approaches to drawing as two are very rarely similar and I would like you to think carefully about your own ability where possible. Obviously a lack of confidence can really restrict the work or at best get in the way at times. I would like you to try and really enjoy it much more in terms of the experience of drawing for this is such an important part of the process.
I found the statement 'I would like you to think carefully about your own ability' a bit ambiguous - I was concerned that this might mean that my ability was not sufficient for the course and I should just relax and forget about putting in for assessment. I asked for clarification on this. Hayley said she thought it was still worthwhile applying to be assessed.
You have managed to submit an extensive assignment overall and have worked extremely hard at all aspects of this assignment despite personal difficulties so this is to be highly commended. That said, loosening up and worrying less about what may happen along the way can allow you the freedom and space to make mistakes and it so often that these mistakes can over time become the unexpected and most unintentionally inventive outcome. Creatively these ‘more lucid moments’ are much more liberating and your confidence will grow with a much more ‘devil may care’ attitude. I appreciate that due to your working life this is the absolute antithesis of having the responsibility and duty of care to your patients but in the long run the freedom within this creative path can be for you both therapeutic as well as a liberating release that will bring back the balance of working hard through serious study whilst being allowed the freedom to play, discover and learn at the same time. This is how the work evolves naturally, confidence grows and achievements become a lot more attainable, so embrace the work where you can with a little less earnest approach and exciting things will happen.
Having a 'less earnest approach' will be difficult for me as I feel that my earnest approach is what has got me this far. I will try to embrace this (but trying too hard to change my approach would also be excessively earnest! - I'll try hard not to try so hard!! - a bit of an oxymoron!)
Your learning log is well written and articulate and fully supports your own work well. A more developmental and experimental approach to drawing in your finished work (as you have already grasped in your sketchbooks) will enhance your work and experience overall so please don’t feel afraid to ask questions if you have difficulties along the way as distance learning can with a heavy workload be quite difficult to juggle. You have clearly worked extremely hard and I look forward to seeing a much lighter approach to Assignment 4 if you can embrace the approach I have suggested. I am leaving you with this quote below to consider for the next assignment.
‘Intelligence is not to make no mistakes, but quickly to see how to make them good’
Bertholt Brecht
I have seen on the OCA website the work of a painting student who did very well in avoiding tightening up for the assignment piece by working in a large format sketchbook and simply selecting the most successful pieces from this book. I think this approach might work for me as I usually enjoy the sketchbook work much more than the assignment pieces and the more relaxed attitude is beneficial.
Feedback on assignment
Demonstration of technical and Visual Skills, Quality of Outcome, Demonstration of Creativity
Project: Landscape Drawing
Research point: Albrecht Dürer, Claude Lorrain, and L. S. Lowry
A very articulate, in depth and questioning personal response to the work of artists that have historically embraced landscape or have emulated their surroundings in a variety of different ways. Your written research demonstrates that you are good at knitting together ideas and formulae taken from artists working techniques and your visual skills at reading an image are particularly strong.
Exercise: A sketchbook walk
You have made four quick sketches from your walk and have annotated well, describing the temperature, light and points of interest within the compositions.
Exercise: 3600 studies
These sketches are a fantastic example of how to work quickly, respond to the landscape immediately in front, to the side and behind you and demonstrate a good visual sense and visual description of what was in front of you from your garden. The charcoal drawings feel expressive and dynamic and you have explored your medium well in this exercise. Using charcoal lightly, broadly and heavily in places demonstrates that you have approached the exercise as directed, which has resulted in a competently drawn outcome, so well done.
Research point: Monet, Pissarro, and Cezanne
Excellent detailed research containing relevant contextual quotations as well as demonstrating the use of two contrasting artists as well as the history of oil paint tubes and the relationship of working en plein air with approaching the ‘truth’ in nature. Your research standard is high with many threads woven throughout to merge your readings with your discoveries on artists and their surrounding history, so well done as it’s a very interesting read overall.
Exercise: Drawing cloud formations
You really have explored a wide range of media and techniques for this exercise and have maintained good annotation and learning log entries in support of your additional research and practice of drawing cloud formations throughout. For me the charcoal and ink on pastel paper feels very reminiscent of the approach taken by John Constable in his drawing research of landscape and it is good to see you looking not only at the clouds themselves but also the work of other artists in support of your own studies. Your explorations with surfaces are also particularly interesting. The painted over collaged torn tissue, the thickness of gouache and the multi media approach is a successful one and the supporting postcards are also good supporting research.
Exercise: Plotting space through composition and structure
Plotting and selecting an atmospheric scene with intersections of field, sea and sky here has allowed you to produce a very dramatic, pictorially interesting landscape with good supporting studies in your sketchbook. Overall you have critiqued your drawing studies well. It is important, even when studying, fore, mid and backgrounds that you spend time refining what it is you are seeing. Try wherever possible to remember that you do not have to explain everything that is in front of you. You have referenced subtraction, erasing and so on earlier on in the previous exercises so where you recognise that the composition is full of information try to eradicate a lot of it by reduction. Try to use one line to depict the information rather than 5 for example. On many occasions the brain in fills this information and so it is not necessary to ‘explain it all’. Over complication of the composition just confuses the eye and the brain, so allow the drawing space by taking away or leaving parts empty or reduces to its lowest denomination.
This is a fair comment. I felt that this drawing was too 'busy' . I will be trying to simplify more in future exercises.
Research point: Claude Lorrain, Turner
Excellent research throughout, demonstrating your understanding of contextual references of working with foreground, middle ground and distance in the pictorial plane You have again been very observant in your deductions regarding the issues that each artist was involved in and your approach to writing about this is very good, demonstrating that you have good visual and research skills.
Project: Perspective
Exercise: Parallel perspective – an interior view
You have managed two attempts at parallel perspective and clearly have an understanding of how it should be. Overall these studies are not bad for a first attempt and you have clearly learnt from this exercise.
Yes the perspective needs more work but I have made an initial step forwards.
Exercise: Angular perspective
Again this has been another interesting exercise for you. You have found some good help with this approach to technical drawing and have interestingly picked out some errors within found drawings in regard to parallel perspective. It would be good to see you consider this in other drawings at a later stage but tackling the books for this exercise has clearly helped, so well done for not abandoning this exercise. More practice at home could be very useful in your understanding of how to draw interior and exterior landscapes. You have analysed the difficulties faced clearly in your learning log and it is hoped that with more practice you will obtain further knowledge and understanding of this topic.
Project: Townscapes
Exercise: Study of a townscape using line
From your learning log I can feel the tension that has been brought to you whilst attempting to draw outside. As I read through the whole journey, it became clear that your determination to not be paralysed by fear was tantamount and your will power to succeed with this exercise was enormous. For me, the attempts at doing so improve each time and your selection of environment and timing clearly paid off. The drawings do start off very wobbly but judging from the intimidation from onlookers it is hardly surprising. However, as you work right up to visiting a museum at a quieter period of time with your back against a wall the work went from strength to strength. I can only commend you for facing your fear head on and dealing with it in a positive way throughout despite the odds against success. The fact that you referred back to photographs at the beginning suggested that you were not about to abandon the exercise and this proved to be the turning point for you to revisit the outside and deal with things in a more appropriate and beneficial manner from a personal perspective.
Exercise: A sketchbook of townscape drawings
Subsequent architectural drawings in your A5 sketchbook reveal an attempt to tackle composition. The framing with boxes allows you to do this competently and the work feels much calmer overall. You mover on to colour studies, charcoal studies and lightly drawn scenes of Venice, all seemingly more interesting and varied in terms of composition.
Exercise: A limited palette study from your studies
You have submitted competent and well - executed drawings that demonstrate a reasonably good eye for perspective, scale, colour and tone. The limited palette works well but be mindful to not be too ‘over executed’ in places? The detail however is competent.
I enjoyed this drawing but can see that it is not as free as some of the preliminary sketchbook studies.
Exercise: Drawing statues
The final equestrian drawings really pay off. The weight, stance and power of these statues really come through your work. The sense of movement captured is good and it is of little concern at this point that the composition is out. You managed to do it and be successful so well done to you.
Project: Drawing trees
Exercise: Sketching an individual tree
You have clearly drawn out many studies of trees using a good variety of different mediums. The enquiring textural qualities of the details within the trees and their overriding detailing works well and your decision to keep it simple works well as you move through the studies. You have annotated clearly throughout your sketchbook and have made good attempts at working with colour.
Exercise: Larger study of an individual tree
The detailing of the bark, foliage and base is there. The sense of the character of the tree is evident with its twists and bows and I wonder if due to these qualities you could have used ink in a more varied way? However, this is a really good attempt with clear, supporting contextual referencing in your learning log.
Exercise: Study of several trees
You have submitted a fantastically array of work for this exercise encapsulating the weather, light and atmospheric conditions within each piece. I really feel that the drawings on the grey paper are particularly good due to the simplicity of the work overall, reducing line to light and shade in this work really works hard at encapsulating the sense of the piece. You move on to draw very enigmatic pieces and manage to capture interesting composition, tone and colour well. As you move on it is clear that you reflect on past exercises through looking and depicting negatives space and have produced a good series of colour drawings on acetate as a result.
Check and logs
Your learning log is packed with good, descriptive writing demonstrating a critical look at what it is you have been asked to do, the journey you made and the outcomes. Contextually everything is appropriately placed and you demonstrate a sound ability to link ideas together from varying aspects of the course as you progress. The reflective qualities of your writing demonstrates that you are learning from your experiences and putting them practically into place as you progress throughout the course. The checks are complete, extensive and well written and ordered.
Assignment Three
Your reflections on the whole of this assignment in your learning log reveal a troublesome journey with the whole of this assignment in terms of time constraints, work/life balance and difficulties in overcoming the fears of working in public spaces. Your determination to conquer these problems has been very exemplary and the work right up to and including the final assessment work includes these difficulties. However perseverance and sheer determination shines through even to the point that you have a break from the final assignment work and revisit 10 days later to redo the work in a less restrained and controlled manner.
The work in your sketchbook is a lot more relaxed and successful in terms of exploratory approach. You explain your discovery of a fellow student who works through the work and then selects the work he has managed against the titles and content of both exercises and final assignment pieces and this would clearly fit you much better overall as the work in the sketchbook feels and looks a lot more content, questioning and exploratory in nature. Dividing the picture plane is an interesting idea and as you work through this much more experimental approach to drawing and painting the work becomes energetic, vivid and ‘alive’. It appears that then you start to reflect back on perspective drawing and its past difficulties and the work immediately starts to tighten and become a lot more ‘academic’ in nature rather than the free flowing, energetic work that I had come to see in your sketchbook. Yes - confidence problems again. The overarching comment about wishing the pictorial plane had included an open window clearly links to the subsequent reading you have done and correlates with the sense of taking the inside out and bringing the outside in to keep the work exciting, fresh and open. The first final large finished piece therefore looks harshly divided up by the window frame and controlled in terms of pictorial order. You have however decided to include the textural quality of collage to the piece suggesting your creative links to the piece and a more free approach to relaying the sense of perspective.
Subsequent experimentation in your sketchbook and a further understanding of how to obtain a ‘voice’ within your own work is clearly demonstrated in your learning log both in a written reflection and though supporting images and suggests a much freer approach to depicting its subject. The final drawings are much more fluid, expressive and really allow the eye compositionally to look around the page with ease. Keeping the monochromatic drawing limited in terms of palette the work breathes easily and feels confident in execution.
The second drawing in coloured pencil tightens up slightly, quite possibly as a lot of detail has been drawn and although visually much busier the work finds a middle ground in terms of business. The tonal aspects of shadowing in the mid ground works well in terms of slight abstraction within its minimalism and the sense of perspective is a lot more determined than the previous drawing. The colour palette works well on the ground and for me it would have been an interesting challenge to depict (with this medium of coloured pencil) a similar image to the previous one. For example how would you manage to gain the fluidity of line using coloured pencil? What if it were a mainly linear drawing with limited blocks of tone for shadow only? This type of approach will come over time with more practice and so too will the confidence to reduce the image to its simplest of form, but well done for having the bravery to revisit the assignment and move it on as far as you have. I would really like to rework this assignment as I still wasn't satisfied with the outcome. Unfortunately owing to time constraints this may not be possible.
Sketchbooks
Demonstration of technical and Visual Skills, Demonstration of Creativity
You sketchbooks are full, exploratory and fluid. With clear annotation throughout it is clear that using sketchbooks to prepare for an experimental approach to making work works really well for you and your creativity and problem solving techniques are evident throughout. You are using your sketchbooks well and it would be good to have seen a little more evidence of your visit to Venice in there, although I do appreciate that there was an awful lot of work to absorb there.
Learning Logs or Blogs/Critical essays
Context
Your learning log is, as it usually is, very clear, thorough and well written. Despite it being you least favourite thing to do within your studies you are extremely competent at it and it is always a pleasure to read as it clearly lays out the whole journey in terms of difficulties, enjoyments and reflects on your studies throughout. You are good at threading a weaving your reading and research to your own work and the whole process is articulate, contextually relevant, wide ranging and intelligent throughout.
Suggested reading/viewing
Context
Pointers for the next assignment
Your next assignment is ‘Drawing Figures’. Look at the work of these artists in order for you to become more fluid in your approach to drawing.
Gustave Marchetti
Egon Schiele
Ron Muek
John Currin
Otto Dix
Ana Mendieta
Sam Taylor Woods
Tracey Emin
Hope Gangloff
And anything seen in the flesh in terms of exhibitions that contain drawing in its loosest and more interesting form.
Pointers for the next assignment
Look at a wide variety of figure drawing throughout history, especially at the range within each artist for example Goya started off as a state painter before the Spanish Civil War and you can follow the emotional side of the work right through the changes evident in his world. Play around with new materials, perhaps unexpected ones and draw through loose and new techniques, i.e. try out by holding the pencil at the very end, draw with garden canes and ink, wire or anything new and exciting with unknown outcomes.
Tutor name: Hayley Lock
Date 23.01.14
Next assignment due 14.04.14
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