The Development of an Idea

A little while ago I woke up with this image in my head.  This, in and of itself, was not unusual.  Images and ideas for drawings pop into my head a lot, so it was no surprise.  But, this time it was different.  There was an unusual amount of detail in this image.  Usually when I get an idea for a drawing, there isn't a great deal of detail.  Such ideas and images are generally vague and more conceptual than detailed.  If I like the idea, I proceed, working out the details as I go.  This time, however, pretty much all of the details were already a part of the image. 

Life, being what it is, kind of got in the way of my beginning the rendering of this idea right away.  By virtue of the demand of higher priorities, some days passed without opportunity to begin this drawing.  As the days passed, I thought that the details would fade.  That often happens with other ideas if too much time passes between the time I get the idea and the opportunity to begin working on it.  But not so with this one.  The details remained just as vivid days later as when the idea first popped into my head.  The fact that the details lasted as long as they did served as motivation for me to get to work on this drawing as soon as I could. 

This idea, for all intents and practical purposes, was actually quite basic.  But it wasn't something that I could just sit down with a pencil and paper and just draw out.  And I don't have the equipment or software to let my computer do it.  I had to do it directly on paper.  I needed to come up with a way to produce this drawing without the markers and guidelines necessary to ensure that it would turn out right.  On this line of thinking, the first thing that came to mind was an old, simple trick that I learned in school.  All I needed was a compass, some tracing paper, and a soft lead pencil. 

Progress was slow as I had to work out step by step what I needed to do to best achieve the desired results.  The image I wanted to produce had a concentric circular frame, so, my first move was to draw out this frame, using the compass, starting on the tracing paper, and then duplicating the drawing on the paper on which I would render the image.  After marking out the desired positions of the smaller circular portions of the frame and other elements of the drawing, I duplicated them on the paper used for the actual image (minus the marker/guide lines).  I did this by tracing over the elements I wanted to tranfer with a soft lead pencil on the reverse side of the tracing paper.  Then, I placed the tracing paper with the original circular frame on top of the duplicate that would become the final drawing, matching up the frame on the tracing paper with the frame on the final drawing paper.  Doing this, I made sure that the soft lead (that I used to trace the transfer elements) was between the tracing paper and the final drawing paper.  Then, I took something small and rounded (the back end of one of my mechanical pencils) and rubbed over the parts of the image I wanted to transfer.  The graphite transferred from the rubbing provided me with the images I wanted added to the circular frame without the unwanted marker and guidelines.  With the frame image complete on the what would become the final drawing, all that remained was just to draw out the details of the image. 

All things considered, the image itself really had no purpose and communicated no message (at least not anything that was in my head).  I was just taken by the fact that an image with as much detail would first enter my head, and then, stay there and stay intact for what was something of an unprecedented amount of time.  Having that happen, I really just wanted to see what the process from concept to image would yield.     

     
 

  

 

        

 

The Power Of A Woman's Beauty

There are those for whom looking into the face of a beautiful woman is a profound experience.  What exactly is meant by "profound" is, of course, dependent on the individual.  You know, "eye of the beholder" and all.  For some it's kind of a "love-at-first-sight" syndrome.  It can get pretty weird too.  I know this doesn't happen with everyone, but, there are those for whom it's kind of a matter of ideals.  And the biggest problem with it is that the "ideal" is something that exists pretty much exclusively in the mind of the beholder.  Much the same way guys have their own standard of what is or isn't beautiful, there are some guys that have attached a personality or a character to that beauty.  It's at this point that the problems start. 

Some social dysfunctionals have a hard time separating the "ideal" from the reality when it comes to encounters with women.  They see a beautiful woman and are enchanted by what they see.  But, the thing is, it's not just about what they see.  The characteristics that they've attached to the beauty they see they project on to the person.  They, rather quickly, come to expect to see those characteristics associated with the woman's beauty in the woman herself.  When they look at her, they don't see her, they see the person they've projected on to her.  If and/or when they don't see the person they've projected on to her in her behavior, there are generally two things that happen.  Their infatuation with the woman, which has its basis in what they've projected on to her, blinds them to who she really is and they interact with her on the basis of their projection, or, he becomes frustrated or incensed by her failure to live up to the characteristics of who he expects her to be.  I realize that these are extreme generalizations.  But this is the way I've seen it in some of the guys I've known to be like this. 

Besides, I used to be one of these guys. 

I don't really consider myself much of an artist.  But, my ability to render the beauty of women has provided me with an opportunity to enjoy it on a bit more of an intimate basis than one who can only behold it.  I'm nobody's painter and my ability to perceive color is flawed, but, what skill I do have with a pencil has afforded me a stimulating experience in exploring that beauty.  While I am no longer afflicted with this psychosis of my younger days, I still find gazing into the face of a beautiful woman very soothing.  And with the right tools, I can enjoy the exploration of every detail of that beauty.  Everything from the tones and shades of her complexion to the highlights of every visible strand of her hair.      

What's Seen In A Face

In the course of drawing a portrait of someone there are always the usual elements to master that are the first points of concern.  Everyone who bothers to discuss them pretty much have the same things to say about them.  There are always variations in what's said based on the quality of the work, the apparent talent of the artist, or perhaps the beauty of the subject.  But, once you get  past all that, once the artist has found a way to effectively communicate what there is to be seen (and what the artist actually does see) in the subject, then comes the effect that what's seen has on the artist and the viewer.  Now, for myself, what I experience when I see is particularly simplistic in nature.  So much so, in fact, that I never have anything to express that is consistent with established standards of expression or appreciation.  (I've always been something of a rebel when it comes to that sort of thing.)  From what I've been told by more qualified individuals than myself, that makes me pretty useless in such areas.  But, when doing a portrait, there is something that exists, somewhat exclusively, between me (the artist) and the subject.  This is an experience that is particularly profound when the subject is a beautiful woman (for obvious reasons). 

When I was younger, it was something of an issue.  But, now that I'm older, it's pretty much degenerated into an interesting novelty.  When I was younger, the beauty of women existed on something of a kind of spectrum.  The place of a woman's individual beauty was dependent on the affect it had on the beholder (in this case, me).  On one end of the spectrum, was "sexual" beauty.  On the far end was "esthetic" beauty.  In between the two extremes were varying quantities and combinations of the two.  Now, in the center of the spectrum, every once in a while, I'd find what I called a "top-center" girl.  Such women were possessed of a profound, almost bewitching beauty that you just can't stop looking at.  For someone with an abnormal psyche like mine, in the face of this kind of beauty, the tendency to project imaginary elements of personality and traits of character is rather profound.  Now, at this point in my life, this tendency provides a great source of inspiration in adding embellishments to portraiture.  The challenge expands beyond just capturing the subject's beauty.  Now, there is the added challenge of creating a visual atmosphere around her that commicates the affect her beauty has on me as an artist; to communicate the personality or character that I perceive in seeing her.  This has made for some very interesting portraiture.