OAA Annual Juried Art Show (Thursday, June 16th, 2011)

"Laura Horseman" (2011) and "Ruins" (2011, Honourable Mention)

I've participated in this annual juried show for a few years and it's gotten better and better. The work was truly exceptional and I was lucky to be apart of it. I really wouldn't want to judge that collection of work! My recent still life drawing received an Honourable Mention, which is always nice. There are still a couple of competitions I want to enter this year so I better get cracking!

I just became a member of the Portrait Society of Canada, and I'm planning a portrait painting to enter into their annual competition later this year.

Still-Life Drawing: Stage 2 (April 6, 2011)

I'm racing to get this done by the end of the month and being new to using white chalk so extensively in a drawing, I'm a little worried. But I'm actually having lots of fun! There's nothing like creating light with white chalk on tinted paper. It's feeling very intuitive right now, which is great. No wonder so many artists love this process!

Still-Life Drawing: Stage 1 (April 2, 2011)

I just started this today but I've been planning it for awhile. I broke a beautiful container a couple years ago that I was previously thinking about using in a painting. The funny thing is I was more inspired to use it after I accidentally broke it. It looked much more intriguing and I had a great opportunity to do something conceptual with it.

Once I set up the broken pieces, they reminded me of ancient ruins and they have a beauty that didn't exist when the container was intact. So that's what I'll call this drawing; "Ruins".

It will be on tinted paper but I want to incorporate white chalk, which is why I didn't start straight on the "good paper". I'll be using white chalk a little more than I'm used to and I don't know how it'll turn out. That's why its good for me to have a cartoon or blueprint (if you will) so if anything goes terribly wrong, I don't have to start from scratch.

I'm still a little unsure about the composition. I'll take another look at it tomorrow but I might just end up moving one of those little broken pieces around...

Drawing In Progress: Finished!

Laura Horseman, Graphite on Tinted Paper, 9.5"x12", 2011

She's finally finished and I'm so glad! I've also decided to add my new signature, which is the monogram I already use for my stationery. I think it's much better than my old signature, it's much more polished. Thanks for following and sorry about the graphite glare.

Inspiring Imagery from the Entertainment Industry

Just last year I was enjoying the music one of my favourite bands, Sade, when I noticed how incredibly beautiful their album cover was. The album is Soldier Of Love (2010) and on the cover is the lead singer Helen Folasade Adu and I could have swore this was a painting. I was immediately trying to think of who could have painted it and thinking I wish I did it myself! To me it’s clearly influenced by painting but it turns out it’s a photograph/Photoshop as usual. I think it’s interesting that it’s not the usual photograph with the band’s name on it and there is an attempt to evoke a very sophisticated painterly quality. There are numerous other artistic album covers but this one grabbed me because it looks to me like a contemporary realist painting.

Then yesterday I came across this movie poster for The Other Woman (2010) starring Natalie Portman and there she is but, again, not in the usual way. Are illustrators making a comeback in the movie poster business? It could have been the usual photo collage with the title on it but this appears to be a hybrid of a hand drawing with digital elements with the intent to appear mostly as a drawing. I think it’s really well done and it got me thinking that these types of images in entertainment could be helping contemporary realism right now. Granted it’s not painting but it’s a shift from just photos and text back to art. And again, there were always the occasional artsy posters but this one is clearly influenced by contemporary realist art.

I'm not sure this is a trend but I hope it is.

Drawing In Progress: My Friend Part 7

Here's a truer representation of the drawing. Compare that to last week's iPhone photo...this one is so much better! I worked on the hair shapes a bit more. I forgot how time consuming dark areas are to shade in and even-out. The teeth are better (I really hate dental work in drawings, it's very challenging). The eyes are still ambiguous, I still need more information to fill them in more. Overall I feel much better about it than I did last week but I think this may be my last drawing in graphite...

Drawing In Progress: My Friend Part 6

So this paper is a huge problem (I knew it would be). It's not so much an issue in person but getting a good photo of it is a nightmare. The graphite glare on the raised areas of the paper are really distracting. It just gets worse in the darker areas, the light areas are fine.

Anyway, I've done a bit more but I'll have to figure out whether or not I can selvage this drawing based on the paper. It's something to do anyway, keeps my mind off the pain I'm in sometimes which is great for not having to take pain killers.

Drawing In Progress: My Friend Part 5

Here's update, finally. I've started working in some half-tones and softening edges. Just that little bit made a huge difference, she's starting to look real. There will be more soon. Comments are welcome and thank you for following :)

Drawing In Progress: My Friend Part 4

Still putting in those darks. This is helping me see the overall value range. I had to make sure I put the dark part of the hair in so that I could judge the values in the face better. She's looking like a brunette right now but she's actually blonde. What I'm doing is laying in a base to erase out of, which is the easiest way I know of to create realistic hair. There's a lot of edges to blend and I still don't know how I'll finish the bottom. Maybe I'll fade the bottom out...I don't know.

Thanks for checking it out!

Drawing In Progress: My Friend Part 3

*Note: Blogger seems to dull the contrast a bit on these photos.

My trusty 2B pencil (by Koh-I-Noor, my fav brand) snapped last night and I was forced to stop. Since there's no art store nearby I settled for Staples which carries some basic drawing supplies, but not Koh-I-Noor, Staedler. Of course, Staedler's great too but I have sentimental attachments to Koh-I-Noor because theirs were the first serious pencil set my mom bought me in high school. I must say they served me well.

In any case I got pretty far last night. I'm starting to remember some of the pitfalls of graphite such as shine of course which makes me have to tilt my paper to get my tones even at every angle. Also, I have to manage the graininess while not pressing too hard on the paper. Sometimes I get concentrated spots of shine that way...not good.

As you can see in the pics, I'm working strictly in the shadows for now so it looks a bit strange as it's only 50% of what makes something look 3D. My drawings never really look spot on until much later anyway, lol. I'm keeping things pretty basic for now, no details yet until I establish convincing form. I'm also not going to round off all my shapes yet, that will come with softening edges. After I'm done with laying in my tones, I'll go back over everything to get a smooth finish.

Thanks for following, and comments are welcome :)

Drawing In Progress: My Friend Part 2

There was a little scare earlier because I couldn't find my camera but I found it, YAY! So I get to post this update afterall. If you enlarge the picture above, you'll see how I'm using a bristle brush to push and spread the graphite into the paper. I'm doing this because the paper has too much tooth for me to get a smooth finish with just the pencil alone. If I were using a hot pressed paper like Stonehenge, I would skip this step. Once that's done I start placing some general dark areas within the shadow shape to start to gradually break things up. I'll show that step in the next post.

That brings me to the issue of "smudging": I don't like smudging, that's why I will have to go over this whole drawing with just my sharp pencil and refine my tones. Basically, this is the only time in the drawing I'll be using my brush or anything else in that manner. It'll be my pencils and my kneadable eraser from now on. That being said, holy crap, this drawing is gonna take forever! There's a reason why I don't love graphite, this is why. But graphite does have that subtle shine that can give a drawing that special quality, unlike any other medium.

I'm showing a little picture of my pencil as well to show you how it looks. I really can't use a pencil that's not sharp on this paper because every stroke needs to be clean, I can't have any graininess. But I'll explain more about how I'm shading with it next time. Thanks for following so far!

Drawing In Progress: My Friend Part 1

I finally started this drawing on Sunday and this is about a day's worth of work so far. As you can see, I'm concentrating on getting the shadow shapes right because that is the key to capturing the likeness and once that's done, I'll probably get into the eyes since that's always a good place to start. The paper is off some pastel drawing pad I had from about 4 years ago. It's a muted blue but I originally wanted a flesh tone...I just wanted to get started and I couldn't bother to go on another hike to the nearest art supply store, so I thought "This will have to do."

I'm using graphite for the entire drawing for the first time in years. It'll be a challenge on this paper because it's not smooth, it has a bit of tooth but I'll have to just use my bristle brush to work the graphite into the paper more. That's it for now, check back for more!

Self-Portrait ("Listen", Carbon Pencil on Paper, 2010)

This was about a month of work. I learned a lot about my features and used this piece as an opportunity to introduce a conceptual element. I'm never without my music and I thought I should include it somehow. Some may pick up the earphones and some may be confused but either one is fine by me. The biggest problem I had apart from the drawing is getting a good photo of it so I ended up scanning it. It's still not the same as the original but it'll do for now.

Teacup in Graphite plus New Still Life Update

I didn't feel like starting a painting last night so I sketched instead. I loved this angle a lot it gives the cup more of a regal felling because you're looking up at it. It took about an hour or so, I'm not sure. Artists know that time sort of disappears when you're in the zone. I think the rim it too blent but I loved doing the handle, that's the best part of the cup for me.

I'll be starting a new still-life featuring the teacup with cookies and pieces of orange. It won't be huge because I plan on doing gradually larger paintings as I progress.

Rembrandt Reproduction on Mylar (Nearly Done)

Almost done! It won't look much different than this. I want to keep it pretty dark because that's how I like it. Just a few minor things to do, and it'll be done. 

Done, But Not Done

Ok so a few months ago, I was pretty excited to be done my four years as an undergrad, but because the courses I need are not available for the summer I need to go back in the fall for one more semester. I can't say I'm happy about that, I really was looking forward to future plans but that doesn't mean I can't do those things right? Actually I'm in the process of making my future plans work right now. I don't want to say too much but...Anyway, my final critiques overall were good, especially given the obstacles I had to overcome financially. Not being able to buy supplies readily isn't the most ideal situation. But I'm glad that's behind me and I've got a couple of commissions to get done and I'm also working on my Youtube channel. So far I've got four videos, and you can see them here. Here's the most popular of my videos right now:

I will be making more as soon as I figure out what I want to show next. Actually, I might do a video on pencil sharpening for artists and no, it doesn't involve a pencil sharpener ;) . 

Current Work, Thoughts

Welcome to my new blog. I love blogging but I haven't done it in a while. I guess I should start with introducing myself: I'm Crystal Brown (sometimes I write Crystal C. Brown for my art) from Toronto, Canada. I'm currently finishing off my BFA, just few more months to go. After that I plan on doing my MFA in New York but it could be awhile before that happens... Ultimately I want to be a full-time painter, and I think I knew that since grade 10. I was certainly interested in art all my life but that's when it became serious. My work is figurative and I think I can credit that to my personality and the great traditional skills I picked up in high school. I don't think that's going to change too much but you never know. 

Right now I'm really frustrated because I can draw pretty well but I can't paint nearly as well. It's tough to deal with. I expect a lot of myself and when a painting doesn't go right I get very impatient. I just hate mediocrity in my work, especially when I need to get my work out there. I've got some figure drawings going right now, which I love. Life drawing comes with ease for me, and I feel very comfortable with it. It's funny, I always wanted to be a portrait painter but now I'm better at drawing/painting faces within the context of the figure instead of on it's own. What I'm really trying to do is make my figure drawings more meaningful that just "a figure on a page", but I don't know how yet. 

Anyway here's what I'm working on right now: At the top right there's a drawing in progress. It's 18"x24", charcoal and carbon on newsprint. I'm enjoying it, but there's a lot more to go and I really hope it'll be one of my best. And last but not least, I've got a youtube video up, check it out here. That's it for now, be back soon.