Gesture Drawings-2 mins each

by Brhody, January 15th 2023 © 2023 Brhody

Hello! This is my first time sharing my figure studies/drawing for critique. I am keen for some honest feed back so I can focus on what is lacking in my current practice/studies. These were done on a tablet - No digital editing was used, aside from darkening the line work. Thanks in advance!

Done as part of a practice session with poses of 2 minutes in length.
My current goal is: Reduce stiffness and make my drawings feel more dynamic, energetic, fluid

Fran Key (unregistered visitor)

Great on you for getting in the groove with your work Hathel. Doing it is more than half the battle so keep it up. I assume you are a beginning artist at this point, so just continuing to work is probably the best advice.

Having said that, I can critique your work here but not sure really how productive that is going to be since you just need to keep going. In general, I would say to enjoy your practice and choose models whom you want to draw. The more you are engaged with the subject the better the results.

Also, these are a lot of quick sketches, which are important, but also starting to try longer poses is good to gain greater insight into anatomy and get more specific about the forms you are recreating. You are almost totally focused on the contour (outline) of the figures. There is a lot more to drawing than that. So, one technique is looking at the light and shadow areas and drawing those shapes without using thin lines. One way to do this is with the side of your pencil or charcoal.

Negative space is another focus, also cross contour lines and blind contour lines (not looking at your paper.) These practices will help you loosen up and look at drawing differently. That is the main critique of what I see with a lack of variety of mark making. If you expand into using a water media or other dry media it will open up your practice in many ways and promote your creativity. Don't be afraid to experiment and enjoy the process as an artist.

I can see you have a competency in human proportion here and gestural movement so that is looking good and will improve for you. One other thing is that you can experiment with the line quality using thick/thin or simply eliminate a line and move inwards on the body to suggest the form. Light and shadow are paramount to longer studies. I suggest you look at some master drawings and the mark making closely because it will give you a lot of information on how to create your own style. There is a lot to art that most people are unaware unless they want to look. Use the great resources that are available to us if you truly want want to learn more.

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Polyvios Animations

Good noon, Hathel, and greatest work consistently done on your quickest bodies and nudes indeed. Please keep up the most excellent work, indeed!

However, these organic shapes, lines and forms don't seem the loosest, most lightest and liveliest enough to me. Would you like to go for 2.5 more hours of 30 second quickest sketches, with 2 10 min breaks inbetween in some places? As a result, your lines of action will become the most loosest, free-est, and furthermore, most confident in your knowledge and skills. It would and should be guaranteeable that it could help you ace your exams in drawing with each new day of practice entirely.

Greatest luck to you and I hope you've found this simplest tip the totally helpful, informative, and useful.