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 […]
Also tagged architecture, oil, pencilDay one hundred and ninety-one: After poking at a quotidian sort-of still life, I abandoned it and gave myself 20 minutes to sketch this figure from a snapshot I took a few years ago in Bangkok, somewhere on the grounds of the palace. I don’t know who the figure is, or what the story might […]
Also tagged figure study, pencilDay one hundred and ninety: Aaaaah. So nice to have some time to spend working on a more detailed sketch. Today’s drawing is based on a detail of a woman in an early 16th-century engraving by the Venetian graphic artist Jacopo de’ Barbari. I enjoyed sketching her, although the curls of her hair and the […]
Also tagged face, pencil, veniceDay one hundred and eighty-seven: This morning I read that a man carried a small Picasso drawing out of a San Francisco art gallery and into a waiting taxicab. He didn’t pay for it. Today’s sketch is in honor of the hope that the brazen thief is caught red handed!
Also tagged abstract, cartoon, face, pencilDay one hundred and eighty-six: When I decided to make a sketch based on the style of a drawing I briefly saw at work today, I forgot that straight lines are not my strength. I even tried changing the diagonal angle to the opposite side to see if being left handed might have had something […]
Also tagged abstract, pencilDay one hundred and seventy-seven: While looking for something to sketch today, I came across a photo that I took in Pompeii in June 2010. I don’t remember exactly where among the ruins I found these broken columns, but I liked the way they were framed against the blue Amalfi-coast sky in the snapshot. Impatient […]
Also tagged ancient, architecture, oil, stoneDay one hundred and seventy-one: I drew today’s sketch out of my mind. A couple of days ago I saw a painting by contemporary German mannerist Michael Triegel that included the head from a broken sculpture. It seemed surreal to me, and reminded me of the work of Giorgio de Chirico. However, the rest of […]
Also tagged abstract, face, pencilDay one hundred and sixty-three: I know this sketch is morbid, but a conversation with some friends this evening reminded me of an etching that the Belgian avant-garde artist James Ensor made in 1888 called “My Portrait in 1960.” In it, he imagined himself at the age of 100 as a skeleton. My sketch does […]
Also tagged allegory, ensor, self portrait, skullDay one hundred and sixty: Home from Peru and exhausted from travel, I thought I would make one last simple study of a pre-Columbian artifact. This sketch is based on a Chimú figure sculpted in wood during the Imperial Period (1300-1532 BCE). The tall thin object is on display at the Museo de Arte Precolombino […]
Also tagged figure study, sculpture, still lifeDay one hundred and fifty-nine: With only a few minutes to spare today before departing Lima on the red-eye flight back to the U.S., I decided to make a simple line sketch in about five minutes. It is based on a face carved in stone on display at the Larco Museum. I forgot to capture […]
Also tagged ancient