Sunday, March 20, 2011

more competition pieces

This first one "An Men An Women" was accepted into Unclad 2011 and is currently on display at their gallery! The piece they selected is two 10 minute sketches from a lifedrawing session where I was using just a pen and ink with no under sketching in pencil.

There wasn't time to do an under sketch with just 10 minutes, but I wouldn't have done one anyway as I was practicing high stakes art, using bold black lines with no safety net. That and: why bother with an under sketch, you would be drawing it twice and that would dull the striking vitality of a first impression.

It still surprises me that they are only 10 minute sketches. I remember vividly when I made them and I didn't think "and now, I shall create art" I thought more along the lines of "shit the timer started" and pushed the pen into the paper.

I like working that way though, if you sat looking at the model thinking about how your line will look on the paper you've already run out of time. I started both drawings at the shoulders and anytime I caught myself hesitating I'd force myself to put down whatever line was causing me to think twice. I knew that any pause would mean I wouldn't finish since its a lot of distance to cover with a tool that cant block in mass areas like charcoal, paint, etc.

Since I didn't get into the other show with the first pieces I submitted I decided to pick what I thought they would like rather than the pieces I wanted them to like. And so looking back through my sketchbooks I took out all these various life drawing pieces and filtered it down to my four submissions and just happened to get one in!

Here is the link to it on the Unclad website, there is also an audio narration of me talking about the piece, it's a little difficult to understand as it was recorded by me calling a number and leaving a message.

http://www.uncladart.com/unclad-2011/an-men-an-women-by-nicholas-rubatino-audio