Poor And Skinny

I was tidying up the other day and found an old life drawing that I’d forgotten about. I like it very much so I’ve started working it up into a mixed media drawing. People often tell me that my nudes remind them of Egon Schiele’s work. I’m very flattered by this because he’s one of my favourite artists. I often wonder if I’m too influenced by him, but to be honest, I’d developed my style of drawing many years before I discovered Schiele’s work. When I first saw his nudes, I’d found a kindred spirit.

The nudes that look most like his work are based on thin models. It’s easy to forget that a century ago, poverty was widespread and most of Schiele’s models were not fashionably skinny, they were poor and malnourished. My model here is small and she’s been a dancer all her life, which is why she’s thin. It’s easy to accentuate her angles and that lends a Schiele quality to the drawing.

Here’s the mixed media work in progress. I’ve spent about 4 hours on it so far. I coated some Fabriano Accademica in rabbit skin glue then applied acrylic colour washes in yellow, red and blue. Then I worked on it randomly with compressed charcoal and fixed it. Now I’m working up the nude image in oilbars. Still a few hours ago.