Real to Imagined
I draw the majority of my images from my imagination. But many of the drawings may start with something or someone I see as an inspiration point. It might be a long straight nose, or the uniformity of choir robes, that I remember and start with. But after that initial inspiration I am not trying to recreate the look of a person or place. I am then much more interested in the marks on the piece of paper and what they represent. This usually doesn’t happen with designed intent beforehand.
Where the Light Was On
For example, I didn’t start out wanting to show a woman looking off to a high rise in the distance. I started out wanting to echo the long vertical line of her nose with another long vertical line in the distance. It was after I made that second line in the distance that I started wondering what that could be. Then I started designing the scene with intent. Her look was so intensely focused off to my right that I didn’t think the high rise by itself would be a sufficient reason for her to be looking in that direction. A light on would make the difference and create the loop between the woman and the building. That in turn makes one wonder, what is happening in that building?
She Had A Little Work Done
I often start a drawing of a person with their nose. But I tend to do long noses or really big curved noses. I do this because I like making a big first mark on the page. But I got tired of doing that and was thinking about what sort of nose I could draw that I don’t often. So in the middle of the page I put the smallest nose I could. The moment I did that I thought about someone getting a nose job to reduce the size of it. The phrase ‘she had a ‘little’ work done’ came to mind. I built around that idea with other elements that were outsized instead of small, to allow for a big contrast. In the end though the drawing really wasn’t about the nose and the ‘little work’ it had done, it was about the eyes and lips and the BIG work that was done. As a matter of fact to me it looks like the only part of her that wasn’t worked on is her nose since the line is simple and uncolored. Sometimes what you think you are going to drawing isn’t what you end up really drawing.
Asparagus
I have a real penchant for art movements of Surrealism and and Dada from the early to mid twentieth century. I don’t know why but I like things that make me go ‘huh?’ and art from both those movements make me do that. In this drawing it really isn’t the image that does that, but the words. There’s no reason for them to be connected and that is the whole point. Thoughts and life don’t always make sense, but that doesn’t mean they don’t occur.
The Woman Who Drank Too Much Coffee
I showed this drawing to a friend in another country via live streaming video and she didn’t understand what all the marks were about. I explained it by telling her the title, then she understood completely!
The Choir Sings About Tools
The whole idea behind a choir (or any group in a uniform) is to present the group as being more important than the individual. It’s a powerful way to put something out into the world that wouldn’t be possible as individuals. But yet, without the individuals the group could never exist. Yes, each person here is drawn as an individual in the facial features and hair, but when it came to coloring them I decided it would be more interesting to show what was coming out of their mouths as being what made them individual, instead of their skin color.
Why the tools? Well, I couldn’t really think of a great quote or song lyric at the time and I thought icons of tools would be an interesting challenge to draw.
I Feel So City
The idea for this drawing was observing a woman reading at a coffee shop. I was barely able to get the lines of her face and body in before she left. What I was left with was someone who, without the book in the picture, looked rather depressed. I colored her in bright colors to compensate for that depressed look but still saw it. I then drew the background to match her look, not her color. Adding the word play came to mind at that point.
Drawings and commentary © Marty Coleman | napkindad.com