Part 3 Project 5 Ex 2

Study of a townscape using line

This will be a study using line and I'm going to use my sketches of Gainsborough Old Hall as my starting point.  I have to complete my work in pen and ink or something similar.  I chose the Old Hall because I now feel familar with it and am beginning to get to grips with its bumps and hollows.  I also think it lends itself well to line drawing and black ink in whatever form.

The work will be done at home working from my previous drawings and photos.

My instructions say to use a double page of my sketchbook but I'm using my A3 book and taking the centre point as my reference just as the centre of a double page would be.

I'm planning to use my fineliners and a brush pen and I'm terrified because once it's on the page there's no turning back.  Knowing the trouble I've had getting these town pictures right it feels very worrying.

When I faced my page I just froze (this is not new but it was worse than usual).  I wanted to feel free but somehow just couldn't get there.  I ended up standing at my easel just putting fine lines in that I could build on.

This seemed to work because once I got going things fell into place.

Gainsborough Old Hall
Fineliner and brushpen

I got in a mess with the pillar on the far right but decided wasn't worth making an issue of because the focus was on the central timbered part of the building.  I think the "wobbly" nature of the building looks OK - the way nothing is square.

The drawing lent itself to a linear way of working rather than something that flowed and I think not realising how important that was was part of my initial anxiety.

I indicated brick by small patches with brick like markings and it worked better than the conte crayon last time.  There is mown grass in the foreground that I should have somehow shown it would ground the building more (or would it?).  Maybe some stone slabs would do a better job.

There are obvious lines where I made mistakes but considering my initial fears I'm fairly comfortable with this.

I found that my sketches lacked enough detail for me to make the drawing I wanted.  For instance the window in the brick part of the building was very indistinct in my sketch and even in my photo it was just a black blob.  To get detail I had to zoom in and I wonder if that alters the reality of what I saw.  I would make more detailed sketches than I did but as ever it's weather dependent.