sketches

Day one hundred and ninety-nine: This morning I had to look at a drawing Cézanne made in a sketchbook of Michelangelo’s dying slave at the Louvre. When I say had, I really do mean it was my job to look over this glorious page. (I’m so blessed!) And I thought to myself, “I have a snapshot of that very sculpture on my computer, and I think I should sketch it too. Now I’m no Michelangelo or Cézanne, but I did enjoy pretending to be a famous painter dabbling out ideas in a sketchbook. (P.s. While I had to make separate studies of the head and hand, Cézanne’s is a beautiful sketch of the sculpture in a single attempt.)

Day one hundred and ninety-five: Continuing the summer theme, today’s sketch was inspired by a print made by the Norwegian artist Edvard Munch in 1894. The original is titled Summer Night (The Voice), but I don’t know the background behind it. The title and the gray tones remind me not of a summer night, but rather the long, long midsummer evenings that stretch for hours before turning dark. I picked this particular detail because of the main figure with the big brim hat and for the little canoe with three people. In my haste, I added an extra tree!

Day one hundred and ninety-three: I guess it’s going to be a hit-and-miss kind of week. I rushed through this sketch inspired by a theoretical building design by the 18th-century French architect Étienne-Louis Boullée. I saw the original in the study gallery of the Uffizi in Florence a few years ago, and stumbled across a snapshot this evening. My sketch in no way represents the real work of Boullée, a neo-classicist who reveled in symmetry and monumental grandeur. It would be worth exploring more of his designs, when I have more time to tailor the forms and shadows. They’re amazing. Check out a few of his drawings at http://myartcanon.net/works_on_paper/built-and-unbuilt-temples-by-etienne-louis-boullee.