Another Attempt at Dry-Brush Painting

This is a painting that I recently finished. Because I felt bad for not finishing those other dry-brush drawings of my friends, due to illness, I decided to work on another dry-brush painting. The most interesting thing I learned when working on this was the difference between using mineral spirits as a medium vs using linseed oil. Linseed oil applies the paint in an almost even glaze, and the mineral spirits actually pushed the paint into the grooves of the canvas making a more textured effect.

Similar to the other dry-brush paintings this was painted on a 12x16 canvas board. Entirely done in a dry-brush method of drawings using only rose madder (windsor newton) oil paint.

Small Figures: Miriam

I can use this small figure to talk a little about the technique that governs most of my drawing and painting process.

1. I start by outlining the contour of the figure and blocking in the shadow shapes.

2. Then I fill in the shadow with one to two values keeping them low in contrast to each other. This drawing is only taken this far.

3. The next step that would come after this drawing would be to start turning or rounding the forms away from the shadows.

More step would follow for a completed drawing, but they will be hard to describe by just looking at this particular figure drawing. So I will save them for another post.

Miriam Sketch

I have dozens of small figure drawings that I did while studying at the New School of Classical Art in Providence. The head instructor of the school was Dana Levin, whose work is pretty fantastic, check out her website if you get a chance (http://danalevin.com/). I plan to highlight each of these small figures individually writing about the process involved and give people insight into the models' lives as well.

Dry-Brush Paintings of Friends

These are two paintings where I did of friends from school. It was the same setup at the academy as the Thom portrait where we paired off and drew/painted each other. For these I wasn't paired with anyone and had a chance to paint two different people. They are unfortunately unfinished because I became very ill in the last week of the poses and couldn't make it to class.

The sizes are 12x16 and 12x18. They were painted on canvas mounted on panels that I made myself. The paintings are used with a dry-brush method of drawings using only rose madder (windsor newton) oil paint.

Students and Instructors' Blogs

A few of us at the academy have blogs that are worth checking out. We chronicle our painting and drawing adventures giving information about each piece we create as well as drop occasional bytes of wisdom. If anyone out there has a special request for a blog post let me know via comments and we will do our best to oblige.

Here are links to the ARA blogs out there on the web.

Julie Beck: http://juliebeck.blogspot.com/

Emmy DeMusis: http://emanuelademusis.blogspot.com/

Brian MacNeil: http://brianmacneil.blogspot.com/

Joseph Pfeiffer-Herbert: http://jphfinearts.blogspot.com/

Small Figures: Frank

This was one of the first portraits that I drew from life for an extended period of time. the model was Frank, and he was really great. He spent a large portion of his modeling time counting in his head. Sometimes without telling him we would vary the number of minutes in the pose and afterwards he would always know how long it had been. I think he is working on a computer science masters degree somewhere.

Frank Sketch - sold

I have dozens of small figure drawings that I did while studying at the New School of Classical Art in Providence. The head instructor of the school was Dana Levin, whose work is pretty fantastic, check out her website if you get a chance (http://danalevin.com/). I plan to highlight each of these small figures individually writing about the process involved and give people insight into the models' lives as well.

Double Figure

This last Fall quarter I worked on a drawing at the Academy of Realist Art that was unlike anything I had done before. It was a drawing of two models at the same time. It was surprisingly easier to block in all of the major proportions and features of these models because there are so many horizontals measurements that match up between the two models. Normally you just have one model standing in front of you and nothing but empty space off in either direction for measurements. If for some reason you artists out there get a chance to draw from two models, don't pass it up.

This drawing was done with carbon pencil on Watercolor paper. The type of paper was 300lb hot pressed if anyone is interested. The reason for this was to keep a fairly smooth texture with just a little bit of grit to it.

Small Figures: Mike

This pose was actually done at the Sprinkler Factory Atelier run by my friends JoEllen and Chris Reinhardt. As a quick plug for them they run a drop-in figure drawing session at their studio on Tuesday nights at the Sprinkler Factory building, in Worcester, MA on Tuesday nights. For more information go to JoEllen's website http://www.joellenreinhardt.com/page9419.htm.

My attempt for this drawing was to work in some cross hatching techniques when I began modeling the form. Let's just say I've at least improved that ability since this drawing.

Mike Sketch

I have dozens of small figure drawings that I did while studying at the New School of Classical Art in Providence. The head instructor of the school was Dana Levin, whose work is pretty fantastic, check out her website if you get a chance (http://danalevin.com/). I plan to highlight each of these small figures individually writing about the process involved and give people insight into the models' lives as well.

Small Figures: Robert

This model was named Robert. I remember working with him because he was practically a statue standing absolutely still. Dana Levin, our instructor, said that everyone had a nice drawing that day because of his strength at posing. Another interesting note about his model is that he as a night shift worker who came to our school after work at 9am and then went home to sleep. We were glad for his dedication to the arts, as well as his killer mustache.

Robert Sketch

I have dozens of small figure drawings that I did while studying at the New School of Classical Art in Providence. The head instructor of the school was Dana Levin, whose work is pretty fantastic, check out her website if you get a chance (http://danalevin.com/). I plan to highlight each of these small figures individually writing about the process involved and give people insight into the models' lives as well.

Small Figures: Catarina

This was a great model that sat for us at the New School. She also sat for a few poses for Dana Levin. The results of those paintings were pretty spectacular. The model had another part time job working with autistic children in Providence. Most models have a part time job on the side, even the famous Ernesto. This drawing is one of the rare times where I added some form modeling in the lights, particularly on the leg.

Catarina Sketch - sold

I have dozens of small figure drawings that I did while studying at the New School of Classical Art in Providence. The head instructor of the school was Dana Levin, whose work is pretty fantastic, check out her website if you get a chance (http://danalevin.com/). I plan to highlight each of these small figures individually writing about the process involved and give people insight into the models' lives as well.

Small Figures: Maya

I have dozens of small figure drawings that I did while studying at the New School of Classical Art in Providence. The head instructor of the school was Dana Levin, whose work is pretty fantastic, check out her website if you get a chance (http://danalevin.com/). I plan to highlight each of these small figures individually writing about the process involved and give people insight into the models' lives as well.

Maya Sketch - sold

This was a small sketch for a larger figure drawing that I did in charcoal. Unfortunately the large version of this images was damaged and is no longer viewable. The model was a great actress and is now currently working as a stunt-woman setting her self on fire.

I usually like to make a smaller sketch before making a large drawing. This is useful for getting a better understanding of the drawing beforehand. The mistakes you make in the small sketch will pop up again in the larger version so it is to the artists benefit to work out all of those drawing problems in the beginning.

Portrait of Thomas

This is a portrait of a friend of mine named Thom. At the academy we spent three weeks in pairs sitting for each other's portrait. It was a good experience to learn what it was like to sit as a model, and it gave me a chance to work on an extended portrait.

This was drawn in red and white chalk on toned paper. It has won two different awards. It received Honorable mention in the North Rivers Art Society's "Focus on the Figures" show. Also it was a 'Juror's choice' award winner in the Cambridge Arts Association. Thom is very proud.

If you're in the area of Cambridge and you're interested in going to the show's opening (Friday May 20th) you can get details about it at their website. http://www.cambridgeart.org/

New Blog

It's all the rage to do blogs these days. So I am going to try again and post a blog about my artistic adventures.

I plan to start this blog by posting some of my favorite drawings and paintings from the past. This will sort of get me in the blogging mood and hopefully will help familiarize people out there with my work.

As I begin new paintings and drawings I will post the 'work in progress shots' so that everyone can see how I work through a painting/drawing.

At some point I will also post a few procedural blogs about the various ways that I stretch paper, make canvas boards, or any of the other material related topics that people out on the web might be interested in reading about.

Finally if you are interested in purchasing any of my smaller sketches you can browse through them on my new Etsy site. http://www.etsy.com/people/JPHerbert