Discussions with Mark Norseth

In my Life Drawing Studio class, I sometimes enjoy adding the element of color when the pose is an hour or longer in duration.  Watercolor is a convenient and sometimes ideal way to go…thoughI have to admit that  if the drawing aspect isn’t working,  no amount of color work will make up for such a weakness,  and  so I don’t recommend it to students until they are well on their way.

For anyone who wishes to give it a go, I ‘d recommend starting with monochrome wash until you’ve got a mastery over wash, know your brushes and paper (which need to be of good quality), and especially the drying characteristics of your paper.  I use Arches 140 lb and Saunders 200lb, which are both great papers.

My normal watercolor palette, which is primarily used out-of-doors,  includes the following colors that are perfectly suited for figurative work:

Raw Sienna,  Naples Yellow, Cadmiums Orange, Yellow, Lemon, and Scarlet, Indian Red, Light Red, Alizarin Crimson, Permanent Rose, Raw and Burnt Umbers, and Ivory Black.  These, in  addition to the blues, greens and other colors I regularly employ, are a well rounded group for general painting indoors or out.

No photos, no images….frankly, we were working so happily and busily that I never took the time to shoot anything.

But the workshop was successful beyond my expecations, the response afterwards has been positive, and I’m very grateful to have had the opportunity to help so many people.  And the best part was that what was beyond my expectations was the attitude of the participants!  To a person, they worked as only the inspired do. I’m very proud of each of the 13 who attended.  Hard to quantify such an experience, but we will be repeating this workshop again, so if interested, send me an email and I ‘ll get you on the advance list for next time!

Here’s some of the advice that surfaced:

Be a painter first, a watercolorist second.

Suggest, don’t explain.  The word “Suggest” is printed indelibly on the face of my own watercolor palette.

Draw from models, memory, imagination, and draw in the streets.

Dry in the lights, wet in the shadows (“When you paint light, you paint form, when you paint shadow, you paint stmosphere.”).

Art never will come to you, you must always make the first move. 

So chew on these thoughts, work in your sketchbooks constantly, and  remember to be always looking, always designing, seeking fluency, and willing to work. 

11 x 14″ Practice sheet from the workshop…heads constructed from a skull, and varied for direction, gender, and expression.  Drawn and painted from imagination.  Great way to study, and fun.

We had our final Summer class at the Academy this last week, and because I have some serious drawing aficionados in our group, I wanted to sit with them and work out a portrait head from start to finish.

Lee, a last-minute life-saver of a model, came in unknown to me and quickly became a favored male head to draw and paint.  Lee sits cheerfully and  as unflinching as the Great Pyramid of Cheops, and we had six hours to make something happen.

Carbon pencil on white drawing paper, 11 x 14″

I used five grades of  Wolff’s carbon pencils (HH, B, 2B, 4B, 6B) on a sheet of regular Strathmore drawing paper, with a little eraser work at the end. I worked seated rather than standing so that I could be looking up at him slightly, he has an aristocrat’s head and it was a good decision.

We have a great model in my portrait class, and I think it’s beneficial to arrange to have us paint a nude study to break things up and get us all away, briefly,  from fixating on the head alone.  This is a multi- hour pose, and I’ve worked on this 9 x 12″  study between making the rounds in the group.

Above all else, I’m trying to find the color notes, state them simply and let them do most of the talking.

Sanguine seems to be very sympathetic to the rendering of human form, and so many of my favorite figure drawings are executed in it that I enjoy putting it to use from time to time.

Kohinoor manufactures the sanguine crayon I used on this, which I place in a brass holder and sharpen with a beautician’s callous remover.  It’s got a slightly waxy binder, barely noticeable, and  works fine for what I want to do.

My first step is to lay down a light tone with broad and easy strokes, which I rub loosely into the paper (a warm straw-colored Canson Mi-Teintes, the non-golfball-textured side)  with either a bit of soft, unprimed linen canvas or  paper towel, and then develop the drawing working from the outside-in, getting the big outer shape of the head established as best as possible, and gradually bringing the entire drawing along from there.

The longer I can resist adding the features of the face, just working with the underlying forms ( kind of like the look of a nylon stocking over a bandit’s head!) the better.  My own taste is for the drawing to emerge somewhat loosely and casually from the paper, not suffered over to the point of being hard on the eyes of the beholder, if possible. I’ve seen drawings that have that sense of growing out of the page effortlessly, somewhat rarely I admit, and I’d like to get that sensibility into my drawings. I’ve used the term “casual elegance” to try and describe it, but that’s not sufficient.

If I ever get it, I won’t need to explain it. We’ll both know I think.

In the darks, moistening the tip of the crayon slightly gives a richer note.  Removing highlights with a kneaded eraser is the last step. This pose was a little more than an hour, and is carried about as far as I wish to go with it as far as rendering.  I always want to get a better expression though. Any fatigue of the model should never show.