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Monday continues to be the day I work on portraits. Here’s a couple images of the clay as I continue to work towards a likeness. The mouth/chin area is coming along, though there is still quite a bit of work to do on the eyes.

– Jeremy

I haven’t posted a new picture in a while, so I thought that I’d show everyone what I did over the break. I don’t know how different it looks to the casual observer, I stare at the painting for several hours a day so you can imagine that I have a different view on how much has changed from day to day. What I can say is that the underpainting is (nearly) complete. I may move on to a full palette on the next work day, or perhaps I’ll give the faces one more pass before I do that. Alek’s face in particular could use another pass. I am very anxious to move on however. It would be nice to have the drawing locked down before dealing with the subtleties of color, but I suppose there is always opportunity to improve the drawing. Oh, and I have a critique with Eric Fischl on Tuesday. Wish me luck…

I’ll try to write a catch-all post to talk about some of the other things going on in NYC as well. Cheers.

– Jeremy

Bet you’ll never guess what I did this weekend! Well, actually, on Saturday I got all sorts of stuff done: house-cleaning, volunteering at the Marion County Historical Society (I should probably write up a separate post about that), and a wonderful St. Patrick’s Day concert of Celtic harp guitar music with photos and stories of Ireland by John Doan.

On Sunday, though, I got down to brass tacks; sock-knitting, that is. I got quite a bit done: two pairs of socks finished, and well into another pair.

These are the Opal Rainforest Ladybug socks I knit for my grandma. They came out really cute, and well-matched. Now I have to figure out what to do with the leftover yarn. Hm…One of my colleagues at work is having a baby before too long, so maybe I will try making a little hat and pair of baby socks from it.

Next, I finished the Pretty Comfy Socks for myself. They are indeed pretty comfy, not to mention cute, and I can’t wait to wear them. Sadly, though, I have an ankle blister at the moment, and don’t want to wear them until it flattens out. So maybe later in the week…

While weaving in ends on the Pretty Comfy Socks, which were my back-up project, I began to feel anxious about not having a project going, so I launched into the socks above: the yarn is Sock It To Me Harlequin from Elann.com that was given to me as a gift. I’m (crossing my fingers) making a pair of socks for my aunt, assuming that my mom’s guess on her foot size was correct. Since my parents are coming out to visit me the last week in March, and we may be visiting my aunt, I thought it might be fun to surprise her with a pair of handknit socks, since she’s a nurse on her feet at all hours of the day and night. These will just be a basic pair of toe-up short-row socks on #0 needles. I ended up getting quite a bit more done on this sock after taking the first photo—here it is at the end of the evening:

At this rate, they will definitely be done by the 30th.

I also got a cuff started with the Wildfoote cone I got from Paradise Fibers last week, mostly just to get a feel for the yarn and how it was going to knit up. I love the colors, and so far the yarn hasn’t been twisting back on itself, which is a complaint I have heard about this particular brand.

Finally, I now have the yarn and pattern to make the Curlicue Coverlet. After reviewing the pattern, I think I am going to get a circular needle and type out the instructions line by line so that I can cross each one off as I go; that way I will be less likely to lose track of where I am in the pattern. At any rate, I should be starting it in the next week or two.

I hope you all aren’t getting bored with my sock knitting posts…I’ll try to write something about my new archives experience this week. I’m always encouraging Jeremy to post about what he’s up to in NYC (earlier this month, he visited Vincent Desiderio’s studio earlier and helped him move some paintings for an exhibition at the school), but I know he is swamped with schoolwork—graduation is now officially less than two months away!

I had my mid-semester critique this past Thursday. That’s sort of the last major hurdle before the end of the diploma project. There is an end of the year critique, to which the entire school is invited, but it seems to me that one is sort of a no-lose situation (provided you’ve actually put in the work on the project). After all, the painting is ‘completed’ at that point…

At this point, however, a bad critique can really throw a wrench into the works. Of course, that isn’t always a bad thing. I have had a couple of rough critiques that I’m sure will have been key in helping me to making a stronger painting. They’re just difficult to cope with at the moment.

Before the mid-semster critique, I had a handful of additional critiques, both official and friendly (as soon-to-be MFA-touting artists, we students are quick to give both solicited and unsolicited advice to our peers). Generally peer critiques are much more congenial—though no less honest—than the critiques with the faculty. There is a real sense of camaraderie at a small intense school like the New York Academy of Art. We all genuinely want to see our schoolmates create the best work that they are capable of.

Prior to the mid-semeter critique, comments I received ranged wildly. Here are a few of the highlights:

“Based on the poor quality of your references, you should abandon this painting as soon as possible and start another painting while there is still time to finish one.”

“The background is uninteresting and unconsidered, and the the most important head in the composition is gesturally awkward and should be completely reworked.”

“Did you know that you are painting purple, toeless, android people?”

“It’s coming together—just keep on doing what you are doing.”

In general, people seemed to be unsatisfied with the background and the general color harmony of the piece. Actually, those two things are directly related, since all of the local colors in a fully resolved work will necessarily need to have a touch of the ambient color of the environment.

It took me several days to recover from some of those comments. I woke up one morning, thinking about all of the things I had heard, and it occurred to me that the problems that people had were with how the painting looks… but that isn’t how I see the painting. I don’t have a problem with the color development because I know that the painting is going to change significantly once I move past the underpainting. But everyone else can only see the painting as it currently exists.

This revelation only made me more determined to carry on my work and see the painting finished as it is in my mind’s eye. I just needed to not be distracted by the ridiculous number of critiques we must overcome to complete the requirements for graduation. Unfortunately, this revelation came the morning before my mid-semster critique. However, the actual event went much more smoothly than I could ever have hoped: They actually had some useful and constructive advice for me. Here’s an image of the painting as it existed on the day of the critique.

The most pragmatic advice actually came after the mid-semster critique when I had another (regularly scheduled) critique with Will Cotton, who reminded me that there are a significant number of problems that will need to be resolved once I move into a full palette. So, while the foundation is extremely important, I should finish it up as quickly as possible so as to leave enough time to solve the upcoming problems. That’s some advice I do plan to take…

The most constructive advice came from Bain, who really has spent a great deal of time thinking about my work and giving me advice on how best to proceed with the piece, as well as thoughtfully tempering the jagged diatribes others have loosed at me. Bain, if you are reading, I am much indebted.

The coming week is Spring-Break week, so hopefully I’ll have ample opportunity to work on the painting. Wish me luck.

- Jeremy

Lots of knitting done over the weekend, and I have a few pics to prove it. First off, I finished my parents’ socks, and they were mailed off today, snug in cute little sock sleeves (idea courtesy of Carolyn via Grumperina).

Hope they fit well, Mom and Dad! Let me know when they arrive…

Next, I made quite a bit of headway on my Pretty Comfy Socks, enough that I can now say, yes, they will be pretty comfy. I followed the directions through the cuff/instep pattern, but just kinda winged it after that, with short-row heels and toes. Seems like they are just flying off those log-like #3 needles, after doing so much on #0s and #1s lately.

And finally—in the sock marathon, that is—I got started on a pair of socks for my grandma. As a charter member of the Dead Bug Society, as soon as I saw this Opal Rainforest yarn in the Ladybug colorway, I knew I should knit a pair of socks for Grandma. Last night I knit the foot of the first sock, and am ready to do the heel shaping tonight.

And now for something we think you’ll really like (says Rocky the flying ferret):

These are the Bomber Cap and Mittens from Knitter’s Stash. I made the hat several weeks ago, and have been happily wearing it ever since. The mittens needed to wait for the arrival of reinforcements (I didn’t have quite enough brown Classic Elite Wings), and I knit them up in a few hours this weekend. These knit up extremely soft and warm, and the mulberry Chinchilla worked nicely with the dark brown Wings—good job choosing the yarn, Mom! I made a few slight adjustments to the mittens, making them longer in the cuff and narrower to better fit my tiny wrists. They were field-tested today, and are entirely satisfactory. Too bad I didn’t quite finish them in time for the extremely weird snow/rain/hail/sleet/sun weather we had at the end of last week, but them’s the breaks.

I got a package in the mail this afternoon, with a spool of Elderberry(ish) Wildfoote sock yarn and the pattern for Oat Couture’s infamous Curlicue Coverlet, which I’m going to make for my cousin who’s having a baby in September. I saw this version in Brown Sheep Cotton Fleece Oriental Jade, and immediately wanted to make one just like it. And yes, I know some people have had problems with undesired ruching in the past, but what can I say—I’m optimistic and ready for a challenge.*

*I reserve the right to retract this statement if/when this pattern reduces me to a sobbing, stomping, yarn-flinging lunatic. Isn’t revisionist history fun?

The Pillars of the Earth, by Ken Follett

I finally finished reading this behemoth of a book this weekend, after several months’ labor. And no, it didn’t take me so long to finish because of the length of the book; I could only bear to read it for so long before getting bored or annoyed, and putting it down to go knit or watch a movie or something. It’s sad, because I love the time period (12th century England) and the subject matter (the building of a Gothic cathedral over almost 4 decades); but I found Follett’s tone frequently condescending, and his characters and conflicts one-dimensional. His villains are almost cartoonish in their single-minded desire to ruin and/or kill the “do-gooders”; his protagonists, while slightly more complex emotionally, nevertheless change very little over the course of decades. As long as the book is, one would think Follett could spend more time showing his characters’ emotions and motivations through action and dialogue; instead, he often states bluntly what they are feeling, which over-simplifies them, and makes me, the reader, feel somewhat cheated. I also don’t appreciate getting hammered with reminders of events from the characters’ pasts, when they were major events in the book. My memory (and, I like to think, that of most people) is not that short. It reminded me of some of those annoying reality shows that play flashbacks of things that had aired just a few minutes previously.

The plot is more of the same. The protagonists attempt to build a cathedral, while the villains attempt to thwart their every effort at success and prosperity. And you know that every time the villains attempt or manage to perpetrate some misdeed–preventing the use of a quarry, burning the cathedral’s village and market, etc. etc.–the protagonists will come up with an idea either to thwart the attack or rise from the ashes better off than before, all without sinking to the level of their enemies. This sort of plot device works reasonably well in a shorter novel, but it happens so repeatedly in The Pillars of the Earth that there is no tension in the conflict, because you immediately anticipate the outcome.

So, sadly, not a great effort. I understand Ken Follett typically writes spy or suspense novels, so perhaps he was out of his comfort zone here, but I doubt I’ll pick up another book of his.

The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon, by Stephen King

To cleanse my palate after finishing The Pillars of the Earth, I immediately picked up The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon, a slender, somewhat unusual outing for King that I gulped down in the course of one afternoon. I say unusual because the book focuses entirely on a single character, Trisha, a 9-year old girl who finds herself lost in the woods of Maine and New Hampshire for over a week. King does an excellent job of describing the changes to her physical, emotional, and mental state as the days pass. Her biggest comfort is her hero, Tom Gordon, the Red Sox closing pitcher, whose imagined (and later, hallucinated) presence gives her the resolve and the “ice water” to survive sickness, starvation, biting insects, deceptive swamps, and the “special thing” in the woods that she comes to know as the God of the Lost. Divided into innings, the book is full of baseball references, but thanks to Jeremy, I at least know a bit more about the Red Sox than most other baseball teams, and it never got to the point of being off-putting. I very much enjoyed this little book.

I know that it seems like the only thing I work on these days is the diploma project—even I feel that way most of the time. But the truth is that I am still taking other classes. One of these is an Advanced Figure Structure class taught by John Horn. We’re doing a life-sized portrait in water-based clay in that class. Here are a couple of pics. John had me significantly rework the chin right before the end of class, which is why it looks less resolved than most of the rest of the sculpture. It’s really amazing to learn how narrow many of the forms of the face actually are.

Next week, I’ll need to resolve the chin and mouth as well as add ears and hair, and define the neck. This class is excellent—I would recommend a life-sized clay portrait to anyone who really wants to get a handle on the planes and forms of the face. Having a tactile memory of the features is incredibly useful for drawing and painting.

With that segue, it just so happens that after spending six hours sculpting the head on Mondays, I have a portrait drawing class on Monday evenings. Mondays are all about rendering the head, which is time that could not be better spent, as far as I’m concerned. Still my weakest area, though between sculpting with John Horn and drawing with the very energetic Dan Thompson, I feel that I’ve definitely gained facility with facial features. Here’s a drawing we did last night; I think I spent about 40 minutes on it.

The Dan Thompson portrait drawing class is particularly fascinating to me. So much of what is taught at the academy is the conceptual framework for creating forms. You learn about structural drawing, i.e. rendering cubes and spheres and cones and using these forms to build more complex shapes. You learn about anatomy and perspective. With these tools, it is possible to render anything, from any point of view, and with any lighting condition. It is extremely liberating, but requires a great investment in education. Even then, forms tend towards idealization or even simplification. One simply cannot anticipate all of the infinite subtleties of the human figure in imagination.

The other school of rendering is completely about perceptual information. One does not necessarily have to know what one is rendering, as long as you are able to see the shapes in the light and shadow, and render them accurately, proportionally and tonally. Artists in this camp can render whatever you put in front of them very accurately. However, they are limited to only what can be put in front of them to copy.

It occurs to me that the best technical artists seem to be those who have both sets of tools. They tend to work from the model, but they are thoroughly versed in structural drawing, anatomy and perspective, and therefore know exactly what each and every form they are perceiving is, and why it looks the way it does. They are able to push the perceptual drawing past the point of pure observation because they understand where the important elements of the form occur, and can therefore emphasize them to create greater clarity.

Really, drawing is a language of description—the important part is not democratically documenting the perceptual phenomenon of light, but conveying the information of the experience of viewing the forms and light to the viewer. Sometimes this means that the artist needs to be able to explain things they can’t actually see, because the viewer won’t understand the drawing (or painting or sculpture) if those elements are not sufficiently described.

– Jeremy

I have to wonder if you all aren’t getting tired of these updates. Even Julie says that she has a hard time telling what I change from day to day. I have most of the block-in completed at this point. I still need to do a first pass at my feet, which actually are one of the more important elements of this composition. We’ve got mid-semster critiques during the middle of the month. Probably the last pic of the diploma project I’ll post of this for a while, or at least until after the critiques.

– Jeremy

Slowly continuing the underpainting. Not much more to say… need to finish the block-in and start the rest of the heads. I figure it’ll probably take about three passes to render the heads sufficiently well for the underpainting.

– Jeremy