FinishedSketch
Author: Nate Creekmore | Date: 03-03-2012 | Category: Artwork | Comments: 0Tags: NATE CREEKMORE, SKETCH, LEGS, SATYRS, TURBAN, LOG
It's not unusual for one of the many millions of devoted fans who steadfastly follow my blog from week to week to approach me on the street and say, "Mr. Creekmore, I'm one of the many millions of fans who steadfastly follow your blog from week to week and I have a question. You often post dazzling, thought-provoking images from your sketchbooks and many of them are unfinished... do you ever go back and complete any of them?" After I've severely chastised the person for interrupting my incomprehensibly busy schedule and for failing to comprehend that the main purpose of a Nate Creekmore sketchbook is to record gestures and thoughts and to work through compositional layouts before beginning a final illustration, I reply, "Yes, citizen. I do, on occasion, revisit a sketch to add ink and/or color."
Here, for example, is the progression from pencil to ink to color of a drawing of a man in a turban lifting a log with a woman inside of it as several diminutive satyrs (one brandishing a flute as if it were a bat) try to stop him.
And there you have it. A finished sketch from one of my sketchbooks. Now, before you do anything rash or harmful to yourself or to others, let me assure you that I'll be back to post more work next Sunday. That ought to be reason enough to struggle through yet another week of existence.
Cheers.
models
Author: Nate Creekmore | Date: 29-01-2012 | Category: Artwork | Comments: 0Tags: NATE CREEKMORE, PENCIL, SKETCH, MODELS, SKETCHBOOK
Opportunities for legitimate life drawing are few these days so I stay sharp by sketching people and models from magazines.
This interesting looking model has appeared several times in The New Yorker:
Everything I do tends towards caricature, even my "serious" drawings. I exaggerate features any time I draw or sketch.
This next woman came out of one of those magazines that are made up entirely of avant garde advertisements. I think it was probably Vogue. My youngest sister, who is also an artist (http://www.bluecanvas.com/stacree) is generous with her used reference material and shares her old magazines with me.
I don't like to do a lot of smearing when I draw so I adopt inking techniques (hatching, cross hatching) even when I use pencil.
Drawings
Author: Nate Creekmore | Date: 15-01-2012 | Category: Artwork | Comments: 0Tags: NATE CREEKMORE, SKETCH, ART, DRAWING
And for this week, a few more drawings for my sketchbook.
This one, a pencil drawing featuring a stoic Chinese soldier, is from a photograph accompanying an old Rolling Stone article.
Here's a cowboy I did one day in pencil. I tend to draw oversize hands, mostly because I enjoy trying to capture and exaggerate all the expressions hands are capable of conveying.
I used pen and and ink wash for this sketch of a tired man.
I plan on putting up a number of selected pages from the book I've been working on next week. Stay tuned...
thoughts on caricature
Author: Nate Creekmore | Date: 08-01-2012 | Category: Artwork | Comments: 0Tags: HAWAII, DANCERS, NATE CREEKMORE, SKETCH, MCGAHA, GRILLING
It's unusual for me to look someone in the face and not immediately begin to imagine how I'd exaggerate his/her features into a caricature. It's the odd faces, the unusual faces that are the most fun to distort in a way that makes them more recognizable (when done well) than a traditional portrait.
Other than the fact that he has a remarkably unusual face and once appeared in a newspaper holding a trumpet, I know nothing about McGaha. But he's a lot of fun to draw and I've done it several times. Here's a recent attempt:
For me, the more attractive a face is, the harder it is to caricature. The exaggeration in this sketch (done from a photograph in a magazine) is so slight that it barely qualifies as caricature:
(...the woman in the photograph wasn't actually boiling a reptilian fish in a cauldron. I added that part...)
The best examples of my approach to caricature can be seen on the PORTRAITS page where I've put together a gallery of famous (and semi-famous) people who I find interesting for some reason or another.
I'll end this post with a random sketch book image of some Hawaii-ish dancers entertaining a lumberjack in his long underwear.
Happy Christmas
Author: Nate Creekmore | Date: 23-12-2011 | Category: Artwork | Comments: 0Tags: SNOW DRIFT, NATE CREEKMORE, CHILD, MOM, MOTHER, SNOW, SKETCH
It's been my habit to post new work every Sunday, but, since I likely won't be anywhere near a computer with internet access this coming Sunday, I thought I'd go ahead and post an image today.
When I was much smaller than I am now, my mother and I were out walking one wintry day and I got stuck in a snow drift. I started panicking and screaming, "Mom, help me!" She had to pull me out because I was too little to do anything but cry. I think the main thing my mother appreciates about this story (and she often brings it up with a smile) is that it reminds her of that brief period of time when she was actually bigger than me, the humor of which is apparent when one notices how petite she is and how tall I ended up becoming.
Merry Christmas.
Equestrian Samurai and Figure Skaters
Author: Nate Creekmore | Date: 11-12-2011 | Category: Artwork | Comments: 0Tags: SHIMAZU YOSHIHIRO, NATE CREEKMORE, FIGURE SKATERS, SAMURAI, EQUESTRIAN, SKETCH
Here's a drawing from a photograph of an equestrian statue I came across in one of those cheap books about samurai that Barnes and Noble is always selling at a discount. Samurai and samurai imagery turn up a lot in my sketchbook...
According to the caption, the samurai is named Shimazu Yoshihiro.
And here's a quick kind of gesture sketch of a portly figure skater holding up his female partner...
More next week...
OstrichesAndSatyrs
Author: Nate Creekmore | Date: 04-12-2011 | Category: Artwork | Comments: 0Tags: SATYR, OSTRICH, ART, NATE CREEKMORE, SKETCH, DRAWING, INK, PENCIL
Two things regularly appear in my the background of my work:
Ostriches...
and Satyrs...
There's no deep psychological reason for this (not that I know of), I just think they're both fun to draw.
Sketchbook
Author: Nate Creekmore | Date: 19-11-2011 | Category: Artwork | Comments: 0Tags: DANIEL DAY-LEWIS, THERE WILL BE BLOOD, ROOSTER, CHICKEN, SKETCH, NATE CREEKMORE
There's a scene in the movie There Will Be Blood where Daniel Day-Lewis' character has a seat and looks up at the flames spewing out of one of his oil wells. This page in my sketchbook is based on a screen shot from that scene... but I decided to replace the oil well with Moby Dick.
And here's a drawing I did of a rooster...
Sketch Book
Author: Nate Creekmore | Date: 10-09-2011 | Category: Artwork | Comments: 0Tags: PAN, PSYCHE, GREEN, GIRL, SKETCH, MONSTER, CHILD, SATYR, BEGAS, PENCIL, NATE CREEKMORE
Sometimes I'll pick at a drawing or for several days in a row or I'll feel compelled to add ink and watercolor, but my sketchbooks are mostly filled with half-finished drawings that I do quickly. I draw random things from the back of my mind or I use photographs (the bottom drawing is based on a Reinhard Begas statue I saw in a book) or I draw people and things I see when I'm out and about. I draw every day.