Pen and Ink

Yesterday was the second session of my art class at UCSD. The first session was spent doodling and doing exercises focused on varying the weight of your line. In other words, it was a bit of a snoozer but I can understand the necessity. This week, we focused on using lines to form shape, i.e. contours. The teacher gave us sticks with thorns and asked that we make the scale very large so you could really see the lines wrapping around the form. He also requested that we use a quill pen and ink - a tool I've never drawn with before. Despite the messiness and occasionally spillage (see middle thorn), I really enjoyed drawing in ink. It was pretty easy to control the weight of the line and of course the drawing was very sharp and distinct. The effect really popped, unlike my usual style which involves a lot of shading and softening of the image.

Aside from the exercise, we watched a brief film on an artist, Jim somebody, and listened to my teacher babble in his stream of consciousness teaching style. He's quite a nice man but one can't help but wonder if he's inhaled a bit too much charcoal dust in his day. My homework is to continue working on the stick and rose.