Double Difficulty: Drawing Two Models.

Oooh this was a tough one. We were lucky enough to have a couple model for us at life drawing group last night but what a challenge. Two heads = two portraits. Four hands and four feet = one heck of a lot of work! It’s hard to focus in on what’s the most important – do you try and get both people in or concentrate on one? The proportions and perspective are much more complicated and then there’s the extreme difference between African and Caucasian skin tones – so where do you start? And end? What HAS to be included and what can you leave out? It’s unfair to expect the models to hold a pose for twice as long as normal, so in effect you have half the time you’d normally spend drawing each person.

This is the only drawing I’m happy to show and I’m not that pleased with it; it’s okay. The others are strictly practice and very sketchy, focussing on the technicalities of fitting the figures together rather than trying to make a piece of art that works well. It’s done in conte crayons in white, sanguine and black into a large cream sketchbook, using both pages. As you can see from all the wrong lines, it was really challenging. Good exercise though – wouldn’t mind doing it again.