Portrait of a mirror (3rd of October, 2011)
I am satisfied with the way I learned to use the pencil. I am also satisfied with everything I learned about drawing, although I still lose
my breath when I see the works of geniuses.
The image above shows one of my recent and successful autoportraits, and the image below contains the details of the portrait done in pencil.
For all those interested in the accessories I use, on the photograph below I show my mini drawing stand with a colored rough paper Fabriano Tiziano (160 g/m2, 75 lbs, 21 x 29.7 cm). The paper was meant for pastels and that is how it is marketed.
When I don't use drawing stand and high-quality paper, I carry with me a small, handmade leather notebook / sketchbook (photograph below) which my sister bought for me in China (two pieces; it was her idea). They are allegedly replicas of the notebooks that were used by Mao.
The notebook has thin, but colored, yellowish papers, so that I can draw on them with pencils of different hardness, but also with
a white pastel that I use to emphasize light. That is how the sketches I already presented in the post
>> Vacation sketches were made. I use the same technique on the colored high-quality pastel paper and
that is how the autoportrait I showed you in the opening of this post was made.
Pencils, good quality erases, white pastel and my Chinese "sketchbook" are shown in the photograph below.
And, when I speak of sketching, on the image below I show you a recent sketch, made on the 9th of September this year. This is the sketch of my colleague dr. sc. Damir Aumiler during his inaugural lecture. The sketch was after the scanning converted to grayscale, so that the yellowish paper can be seen as the dominant tone of the grey background.
What I really should do in the future if I continue to draw (auto)portraits is to create a strong, contrasty and
adaptable lighting. My portraits should then achieve the "painter's" quality. This means that what should dominate
the portrait, instead of line, is the area that borders with and transits into other areas which are in different relation
to the light source. I made extreme examples of such paintings in >> ink portraits
of Bob Dylan published in a previous post. There, there are only two types of areas / surfaces: those in complete darkness, and
those completely lit up
Pencil is not an ideal choice for realizing areas with smooth transitions, although for true masters such a feat is no problem
at all. I also thought of other techniques and tried working in them, but the level of quality was significantly lower than the
one I achieved in pencil works. Autoportrait in the >> ink wash
technique is shown in the image below. That image is among the better ones I made with the brush. Of course, concerning
(non-digital) color, I am completely ignorant, but I hope to progress in that direction also.
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Last updated on 3rd of October 2011.