COLLAGE: noun or verb? Day 5
3 FIGURES, 2021 (8.5 X 11 INCHES)
Seeing is a learned thing.
Artists need to learn to see edges, values and relationships. They need to learn to see something for its shape, to see a human foot not as a foot but as the various shapes that make it up.
During my weekly life drawing sessions, I love to explore line and shape with scissors rather than with a pencil.
Picking up the piece of paper, I first have to decide on the right place to start. Which spot on the figure will give me some reference as to the proportions of the body?
Having taught primary grades for many years, I know to keep my scissors stationary and move the paper as I cut.
An artist balances two main elements when working: mastering technique and infusing their own artistic expression.
In these figures I am working on technique by exploring the use of negative space (the space around and in-between the figure), line, angles, value, shape, foreshortening, composition and colour.
As an artist I explore personal artistic choices like using denim blue to create a figure, tearing the paper to create a hair braid, using a scrap piece of paper to define the figure as ‘resting back’, using the hairline from a photo to create a hairline on a much smaller figure.
All of these tricks and techniques are stored in my mind for later work applications.
