March's Theme: Jewel-Toned Repose for Tea - Chapter One

This month I got a little overnight stay-cation, and it featured a bit of magical weather. Hence, this sweet, introspective, jewel-toned tea-time repose!

The thing is, many artists who work with the model love to set up upright, classically seated and poised poses, and (in my now 11 year experience) they seem to avoid any reclining and lounging studies. Yes, these kinds of poses can obscure and strangely impede full visual access to the figure, but what it also does is force understanding of how the figure works dynamically with the environment, which is necessary to improve your drawing, painting, and representative figure skills. So, I want to offer some options with this idea.

Things to consider:

When the body is in repose, leaning more or propped more heavily within a setting, more of the physical form is INformed by it's relationship with other objects, like pillows, cushions, etc. Muscle groups you might be comfortable rendering accurately when traditionally composed suddenly take on new shapes within the shapes of softer supportive things, and it can get lumpy and confusing.

If you want to deepen your understanding of the figure, you've got to include how it works within diverse contexts, not just standing or sitting rather stagnant and prone.

The unavoidable relationship between the figure within an environment with FABRIC {clothes} invites so much nuance and opportunity, as well. 

TIP: squint your eyes and look to notice the different larger shapes that clothing folds make, just as you would when finding the shapes of the anatomical forms. All form can be generalized to shapes interacting - almost puzzle-piece like - with one another, and through visually differentiating between them with value and edge-variation, you'll find your way with less headache.

*For colorists - check out the way the daylight affects these colors and changes the temperature of the skin over the body! Love that. Those reds in cooperation are lovely, too.

Chapter TWO will expand on this subject of figure vs environment variation with a fresh batch of reference continuing this theme, coming next week! {Monday}

I also have a color study demo coming, from this reference!