Week 1 - 26th-30th September - Inductions - Drawing

In this first week of normal schedule we had a lot of introductory sessions and workshops to various areas of the university. One particular department which stuck out to me were the 3D workshops on the 28th, specifically the casting and model making suites. The basic casting process was briefly explained however I was told I would need further specific inductions if I was to use some of the heavier pieces of machinery. This is something that is very important to my practice which occasionally features elements of woodworking or other resistant materials. Ensuring I have this induction as early as possible will make me fully prepared to follow any ideas I have regardless of the medium.



The centrifuge caster was one of the pieces of equipment I was most interested in. Small sample pinecones cast delicately out of bronze were passed around to demonstrate physical capabilities of the machinery and a small bee who was so intricate and detailed both wings were cast with tiny veins along them. As a lot of my artistic interests are formed around organic or natural subjects I think it would be really interesting to experiment with this. This method could also have been useful had I continued to develop my summer project involving spiders and other invertebrate invaders. It is definitely something I think I will revisit at a later stage.

On the 29th we also had a sample drawing workshop which focused on representational skills wherein we had to draw one of the many plaster torso casts around the uni in the context of their surroundings. It was interesting finding out about the historical significance of these casts which had been with NUA since it's origins as the Norwich School of Painters. In these times students were encouraged to sit and copy from the sculptures in much the same was as we did to practice their representational skills.
 
Most people were sat around the casts drawing from similar seated positions and because of that a lot of the compositions produced were similar. In response to this I wanted to make my piece a little more visually interesting with a more dramatic aesthetic and chose to compose my image in photograph form as opposed to drawing directly from life. 

Out of my three compositional photos I chose the viewpoint from just behind the back of the main figure (bottom right), not only because it was from an unusual perspective, but also becasuse of the strength and dynamism conveyed, leading the eye through the image along the strong shoulders and arms of the form. By photographing with the sculpture between my camera and the light source I was also able to pick up tonal subtlties created in the sculpted muscle, such as along the ribs and in the hair, which other more central viewpoints couldn't capture.

I chose a blended tonal realism style for my final drawing, as I had tried to emphasise tone in my composition and felt that this would be best represented in a realist way. Once I was satisfied with the finish of my piece I also added a border to enhance the sense of completion. Although this may be less traditional in terms of observational drawing, I like the way it frames the piece and brings further attention to the sence of dynamic composition and also think this contradictory technique juxtaposes against the historically traditional subject in an interesting way, similar to the work of PichiAvo, a muralist pair who combine traditional sculpture imagery with urban graffiti styles whom I have previously researched in previous projects. Overall I am pleased with the way my final drawing came out, however I think I could have used a softer pencil in areas to give deeper tonal depth, particularly in areas with extra shading, and make my image look more three dimensional.