Life Drawing in Charcoal

Douglas R. Graves

• Publisher: Dover Publications
• Year: 2012
• ISBN:
  9780486134062
• Topic: Arte
• Subtopic: Tecniche artistiche

`The guidance to be found within these covers reflects the author's inspired ability as a teacher and artist of the highest magnitude. It is probably the finest book on the subject of drawing the human form that I have ever seen.` — Irving Shapiro, A.W.S., Director, American Academy of Art
This unique guide offers a bold, innovative approach to drawing from life. Instead of teaching the traditional method of building up a drawing from lines, leaving mass and tone till later, noted art instructor Douglas R. Graves takes precisely the opposite tack. The student is encouraged to begin seeing and thinking in terms of tonal masses immediately. This approach enables students to draw quickly and accurately without the need for a line drawing first. The author compares it to learning to `paint` with charcoal.
Step-by-step demonstrations and over 200 of the author's own drawings offer inspiration and practical guidance in the technique. You'll learn how to `see` tonal quality, how to key a drawing, how to translate color into black and white, and valuable techniques for keeping the figure from looking `stiff.` Other topics include the role of alignment in achieving proper proportions, foreshortening, male and female figure distinctions, the use of modeling to achieve added dimension, drawing the face, positioning the figure, and many other aspects of life drawing.
For students of drawing — beginner to expert — this book is an invaluable guide not just to drawing from life but to the essential principles of observation, composition, and draftsmanship that underlie all successful drawing and painting. It belongs in the library of every artist. For this edition, the author has revised previous chapters and added a new one on `Different Modes of Charcoal.`

PROJECT 1

MATERIALS AND EXERCISES

The materials needed for working in charcoal (Figure A) are few and not too expensive. Usually they can be found in any art supply store. On the chance that you’ve never used the medium of charcoal, I’ll describe briefly the items that should be in your kit, and I’ll say something about their use. The list of what you’ll need is the same kit that I’ve used in my drawings. It includes the following:

Charcoal sticks (vine)
Compressed charcoal
Powdered charcoal
Charcoal or carbon pencils
Kneaded eraser
Chamois
Pink pearl eraser
Stump
Bristle brush
Foam rubber powder puff
Sander
Paper
Fixative

CHARCOAL

The charcoal sticks that I recommend for beginners are usually called vine charcoal. They’re made from straight, fine grained woods like willow, beech, and bass. Sizes vary in thickness from 1/4” to 1/2”. Grades are soft, medium, and hard. In an old book, The Craftsman’s Handbook by Cennino D’Andrea Cennini, the author tells how you may make your own “coals,” as he calls charcoal. “Bundle together nice, dry sticks of willow, about the length of your palm. Tie the bundles in three places, the middle and each end, with a fine copper wire. Take a brand new casserole and fill it with these bundles. Then get a lid for it (luting it with clay so nothing will evaporate). Then, go to the baker’s in the evening, after he has quit work, and put this casserole in one of his ovens and let it stay there until morning!” Your baker would probably throw you out if you tried such a thing, so I’d suggest you buy the ready-made charcoal.

A new brand on the market is made by F. Weber Co. called American Rouget willow. It comes in square sticks. I find that it works very well, behaving like the beautiful French charcoal we used to be able to get.

Compressed charcoal (Siberian charcoal) is potent stuff, too powerful for beginners. Since the value of charcoal is its easy removal with erasers and chamois, the tenacious adhesion of compressed charcoal is undesirable; it doesn’t lend itself to the plastic method of drawing that I’m going to demonstrate at first. When you’re more sure of yourself, then compressed charcoal will be useful. Its virtues, on the other hand, are its rich black color, smoother texture, and more permanent quality. Compressed charcoal is made by grinding charcoal and compressing it with binders such as clay, chalk, soap, tapioca, or other ingredients.

In the early phases of charcoal drawing, I’ll advise you to cover your paper with a middle tone. You can do this by using a stick of soft charcoal; but as you zigzag over the page, you’ll quickly use up the stick. An expedient way of covering your paper is with powdered charcoal sold in paper cans. A can of it will last a long time, because a little bit goes a long way. Lay your paper flat and sprinkle the powder on lightly. Brushing it out with the powder puff will give you a nice middle tone. The powder can also be used to render a complete drawing. By dipping a bristle brush into the powder, you can apply it directly to the drawing and brush it on as a tone. Experiment with it, but be careful or you’ll wind up looking like a coal miner. (Caution: near an open flame or spark, powdered charcoal can be explosive.)

Charcoal and carbon pencils are about in the same class as compressed charcoal, except that they’re made in the form of a pencil with a wooden sheath and smaller in diameter. They have the same advantages and disadvantages as the sticks of compressed charcoal. Further hindrances are the need to sharpen them constantly, and more importantly, the fact that they won’t cover large areas quickly. The small point won’t make broad, sweeping passages. But later these smaller drawing tools can be used to accentuate small, pinpoint spots where a large stick of charcoal would be clumsy.

ERASERS

The next items might really be listed under charcoal, because I’d like you to think of them as tone makers for the lighter tones.

In charcoal drawing, the kneaded eraser and the chamois are the best tools for making lighter grays and whites on toned paper. (Oddly enough, the kneaded eraser is a modern version of soft, fresh bread, which was used once upon a time to clean off charcoal.) You’ll get into the habit of kneading the eraser in your hand as you work to keep its clean surface on the outside. You can shape it to render anything: a wide sweep or a pinpoint highlight.

The chamois will make larger expanses of light tones. By wrapping it around your finger, you can remove more at once than you can with the eraser.

If the kneaded eraser doesn’t remove enough charcoal, use the pink pearl eraser, which is firm rubber.

BLENDERS

The blenders are the stump, brush, and puff. I’m not opposed to using a stump, which is merely a tightly rolled paper formed into a pointed tool. I’ve seen some nice drawings done by using this tool throughout the whole process. However, I don’t use a stump because it seems to destroy the patina of the paper. The tones go lifeless and lose that sparkle which the tiny valleys — skipped by the charcoal, but filled by the stump — give the drawing. The same holds true for the bristle brush. It’s a favorite tool for many, and the advantage is the long handle that enables you to use it like a painter (with arm movement) and to keep a little more distance from your work.

For myself the perfect blender is my finger; but I’m lucky because my fingers are dry. If you’ve a tendency to perspire or have oily skin, don’t touch the drawing with your fingers! The next best thing is the foam rubber puff. Its soft texture is perfect for blending tones. The puff makes the tones lighter — about a half step at first — but as you add more charcoal less will come off. Hold the puff tilted up so that just the edge glides, light as a feather, over the zone to be blended. If you want to get into a very tiny spot, double it over so that you have just a point. These puffs are available at cosmetic counters.

The sandpaper pad is a portable sharpener. The conventional pencil sharpener will also hone a round charcoal stick to a nice point. Once you’ve first sharpened the charcoal, you can keep it sharp by rotating it as you shade.

PAPER

As in all artwork, the right paper is important. You can’t use just any kind successfully — at first, anyway. It should be especially prepared for the intended purpose. I prefer the French Canson Ingres #281 white. It’s a 100% rag content paper, sized, and air dried. It has a texture called laid, which means that there are fine, parallel, watermarked lines running lengthwise on the sheet. This texture is heavier and more distinct on one side, making that side the best to work on. If it’s difficult to determine this at first, the brand name is readable on the correct side.

I’ll use this type of paper for most of my drawings in this book. Later, I’ll try other kinds of paper to show you the various possible effects.

FIXATIVE

Fixing can be done in stages as you draw or at the finish of a drawing. A spray can is better than a mouth atomizer — which tends to drip. If you fix during the progress of the drawing, be sure you aren’t going to make changes in the parts you’ve previously drawn.

Personally, I feel that fixing ruins the tones; it seems to dull the luster of the black tones in particular. Of course, my problem is to preserve the unfixed drawing. If it’s possible to get the drawing behind glass, with a mat thick enough to keep the glass from touching, I pr...