Wednesday 7 October 2015

Life Drawing #1 - Abstract Sculpture (and building development?)

In today's first life drawing class we were presented with a large abstract sculpture made of bamboo rods, hula hoops, and coloured paper tape/ribbon. 
I was positioned on the floor as I prefer to work this way, and I liked the height of the composition from my viewpoint. 



Basic outline of structure
We were directed to feel "free" to do what we liked in regards to creating our work, but just to bear in mind our invisible cities project, and focus on the creation of space and environments. 
We had two exercises, the first of which I started by getting a rough graphite line-work sketch of the entire structure. I wasn't really sure where I was going with this, I then went in over the hoops, pole connectors and tape in their colours. I wasnt really worried about accuracy and just wanted to achieve the kind of disorganised movement I felt the structure had. I then started to go over the pole lines, however thinking about my composition in a "space and environment" sense I felt it was quite a good abstract concept work for Calvino's city 'Sophronia' - the city made of two half cities, a permanent fair ground half and a temporary "normal" half. In my work I can see the roller-coaster, Ferris wheel(s), the big top, a helter skelter, etc, and feel the fainter lines of the poles, represent the missing "structure", of the city - as Calvino says in response to waiting for the "normal" half of the city to return "it [the city] begins to count the months, the days it must wait before the caravan returns and a complete life can begin again." The ribbons and hoops would not hold up without the poles, and the fairground city does not work (provide a complete life) without the structured "normal" half of the city. 
(Sorry for the terrible photography, my phone camera did not agree with the lighting in the room and I can't seem to work out how to fix it properly in photoshop) 

First drawing
Slightly better contrast to see the fainter structure lines

Edited composition

Here I have edited the photo to further take away the pole "structure" lines and just keep the abstract faircround city shapes. If I were focusing on Sophronia I could take this forward as a thumbnail/concept idea for developing into my final outcome.

We were then encouraged to take further pictures of the structure, different viewpoints etc and really think about the space/environment created. 




For our second drawing task we were given black paper and white chalk to use, and directed to focus on the negative space created by the structure. I decided to focus on a smaller area of the structure, rather than the whole thing this time. 

Area of the structure I focused on for drawing #2

I began by sketching out some of the lines/shapes created by the poles and the hoop, leaving them blank and filling in the negative space. I wanted to have the ribbons as a separate shade because of their slight translucence. About half way though this process I saw a building appear from my piece, and feel it would be a great addition to my chosen city of Baucis - I see this city as being self sustainable and so having bio-domes alike to the Eden Project, but from this drawing I was reminded of the giant glass pyramid entrance to the louvre I saw when I visited Paris last summer, and thought my city could have a structure similar to this instead of domes. I have also been experimenting with the idea of suspended and multi-level buildings for my city and felt the hoop shape above and ribbon lines coming down could be part of another building.

Louvre entrance reference picture.


I blocked in some more negative space colour and blurred some edges instead of filling them in to further create the shape of the possible triangular structure. 
I also finished filling in the negative space in the hoop. pad out the idea of a platform/building above. I will take this drawing further and use it to develop more building concepts and maybe even as a reference for my exterior low angle shot composition. 








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