Looking for Shapes and Drawing
Exercise 1
I chose this postcard as the image for this exercise. I was drawn to the colours and the undulating shapes. I was curious to see how well the various aspects of the photograph could be interpreted on paper.
Drawing 1 - surface textures
This was the image for surface textures:
The printing "block" is actually one of the feet you stick under furniture legs to stop them scratching the floor. Made of quite firm foam material, it had a nice weave-like structure that I thought would work well in my interpretation of the weave of the fabric.
To rule colour out of the equation I worked in natural black pigment ink.
Oh dear, not very successful! There is some weave texture in there but my attempts to create delineations where the folds are by using more/less dense printing can only be described as an epic fail :-( There are some areas where it has almost worked but even viewed from a distance it would be impossible to see this as anything other than a series of muddy boot prints!
Drawing 2 - Colour
Second onto the colour drawing:
This was painted in Anilinky watercolours with the paper quite wet to create lots of colour blending. I pared down the shapes to the barest limits to focus purely on colour, taking just three basic sections of the viewing frame. I used a limited palette of colours, allowing variations in the paint and the lines made by the brushstrokes to create the different tones within the woven structure.
I am pleased by the simplicity of this piece and think the tonal changes, particularly in the blue/teal section, have worked well.
Drawing 3 - Shapes
To enable me to focus on the shapes (so difficult when I am always drawn to colour!), I chose a very simple line drawing in pencil.
The photo here is a little pale but I can see how, despite being a fabric, there are nonetheless strong shapes made by the undulating folds. The shadows created by the light falling on the fabric emphasise the shapes yet further. I could see potential in working with these shapes as the basis for a repeating-print fabric.
And I should credit Christina Chisolm as the weaver of these beautiful wraps:
