Description
Cast Drawing & Painting
Introduction:
In this opening video, LFAS Director Ann Witheridge introduces the course and the utility of the plaster cast. Situating the plaster cast in a long history of art education, this video touches on the advantages of working with the cast as object, and its ability to push your eye, technique, and representational skills.
Unit 1: Setting Up
In this first session, LFAS tutor Joni will walk you through how to set up your plaster cast for your first drawings. By exploring different possibilities with lighting, angle of the cast, and positioning, you will begin to get acquainted with the cast and start to hone in on what you would like to explore in your drawing, whether it be soft or hard edges, artificial or natural light, and even the particular shadow shapes that are most interesting to your eye. You will also explore what simple materials you will need to get started, including paper, charcoal, putty, eraser and a brush.
Unit 2: Proportion, Gesture, and Shadow Edges
In this second session, you will work from your plaster cast as you begin to put charcoal to paper. Working only with line, you will focus on representing your important shapes, proportions, and gestures with accuracy. Joni will teach you tools to describe with precision lines the critical shapes of your plaster cast, including discussing how to edit, how to step back and assess your lines against the cast, and what it looks like to begin to incorporate ideas of movement and rhythm (gesture) into your initial sketch.
Unit 3: Mass & Values (Drawing)
In this third session, you will introduce mass and values to your sketch. Using the highly distinct shadows that the white of the plaster cast reveals, you will begin by working in two tones, then gradually adding midtones. This in-depth session will go into extensive detail on how to continually adjust as you go, how to work from big to small shapes, what tones and effects different types of charcoal will produce, and most importantly how to understand values in relationship to each other (and harness the rules and power of contrast!).
Unit 4: Edges
After having introduced form in the prior lesson, this fourth session will look at the edges of that form–are they soft or hard, how linear are they, what does that mean, and how can you accurately represent these subtleties in your drawing? As one of the three pillars of your drawing–shapes, values, and edges–this session gives you an integral and detailed understanding of the types of edges we see in the world, how they interact with plane changes, how to represent the transition between tones, how to refine your edges with increased accuracy, the effect of paying attention to the edges, and the role of copying a cast in your development as an artist.
Unit 5: Accents
In this fifth session, you will explore accents–little “light ticks” and “dark ticks”–and their ability to direct the viewer’s gaze. For the first time, you will have some choices to make about what you want to jump out from your page, and what you’re okay with softening. Using examples, Joni will illustrate how you can increase or decrease contrast in certain areas–often in the form of accents–and how that can powerfully draw the viewer’s attention. Finally, you will apply these ideas to your own drawing, making intentional decisions, and working to reflect these choices with skilled subtly while still maintaining the integrity of your shapes and values.
Unit 6: Transitioning to Oils
In this sixth session, you will transition to working with oil paints. As you move into this new medium, you will be encouraged to apply the same strategies, philosophy, and visual language you developed in the drawing section of the course. This session will focus on introducing you to your new materials, including an exploration of thinners, brushes, palettes, panels and paints. You will then learn how to tone your canvas, a simple but integral step to prepare for next session’s dive into painting.
Unit 7: Mass & Values (Painting)
In this seventh session, you will work from your toned canvas to create an underpainting, or “imprimatura.” Beginning with a lesson in proper brush handling techniques, you will then deploy the same strategies you honed in the drawing section of this series: starting with simple lines, separating lights and darks, and then moving from lines to shape. This session will also go in depth on how to integrate and adjust mistakes, and how to approach your work not as simply “copying” but as a holistic exploration of light on form.
Unit 8: Building the Whites
In this eighth session, you will introduce a new pigment to your work: white, and with the white, the illusion and effect of light. Starting by developing a small value scale, you will begin to apply white to your canvas, building out your lights with attention to big shapes and simplified forms. Imagining the cast as a blocky form, you will practice applying your lighter values in thick strokes to create a sense of relief, working to turn the form as you pull the lights off the page. Alongside your work on the canvas, you will also practice important adjacent technical skills, like cleaning a palette, adjusting your paint thinner, and correctly choosing your brushes.
Unit 9: Edges & Form
In this ninth session, you will continue to create in precise steps, now working on edges to create a greater sense of form and volume. Much of the session will focus on practicing how to mix intermediate values, and how to assess your values to accurately reflect the changes in light on your cast. By creating the right mix and applying it with increasing specificity, you will begin to create a sense of roundness that will emulate your cast’s form. This session will also explore brush choice, and how to utilize the specific effects of your differently-sized tools.
Unit 10: Accents & Focal Points
In this tenth session, you will add the finishing touches to your painting with the use of accents and focal points. This is the exciting point in the painting process where you step back from your work and make decisions about how you want to create points of interest and draw the viewer’s eye. Joni will show you how to materialize these choices by softening parts of the painting, sharpening others, and moving between detailed analysis and a holistic gaze. You will also be encouraged to approach this cast again and again–adding elements, changing the light source, shifting the cast’s position–all in pursuit of honing your ability to skillfully reflect light and form.
Conclusion
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