Saturday, September 17, 2005




Here are a few more drawings from Florence. These are done in blue ball point pen on toned paper. The picture of the girl is Sharon, who is now one of my students at FIT (she herself is very talented). The man in the ball cap is my partner Jared. I drew this while we were drinking beer in the Piazza Della Signoria. The last one was a man eating alone in a Trattoria. I hope it captures the sense of loneliness I felt when looking at him.

7 comments:

Junko Miyakoshi said...
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Junko Miyakoshi said...

I especially love the girl drawing. I also like to draw with a ballpoint pen, but it's going to take more to draw so precise like you do!
-Junko

Peter Emmerich said...

It won't take you long Junko, you are so very talented!

Peter

Junko Miyakoshi said...

Thank you! I'll do my best!!
-Junko

John T Quinn III said...

Pete,
i've been looking at a lot of BLOGs and they all have the same stuff. nice sketchbook drawings and comments from friends which say "nice" and "great, you're a good drawer." which i admit is important but, not the only thing we should be doing here. i've been trying to engage people in dialogue about drawing and I've had some nibbles but nothing substantial. so. i'm going to pick on you.

in your "lonely guy sketch," what is he doing that says lonliness and isolation? was it the space around him or his body language which gave you the impression? what are your thoughts on the success or failure of the drawing as pertains to the specific emotion you were trying to "capture?"

thanks for playing.

Peter Emmerich said...

Oh sure, pick on me!!

No,no,no..only kidding. I welcome the stimulation, in fact it was what I was hoping for. OK, first things first- He was eating alone and it isn't as if that should imply lonliness (I was eating alone as well and welcomed the opportunity.) He was somewhat older and his meal seemed to be consumed not out of joy, but necessity. With that said the thing that I wanted to capture was his smallness in a way. He was a tiny man with small hunched shoulders, almost childlike. He just didn't seem comfortable, so capturing his specific body language was key to my approach and what turned me on initially. That's why I say I hope it captures it, I wasn't quite sure. However, I do not always approach a drawing this way.

Whether or not a drawing is successful based on a specific emotion attained is a whole other story. I don't set out to acquire emotion. I, like you, enjoy just drawing people who are waiting around. i think the drawing I did of Jared in this set is successful, but not particularly emotional. My intentions are not to inflect emotion but to capture whatever may be idiosyncratic about the person. If there happens to be something emotional I sense that is dominant- like the man eating alone, I will try to inflect that into the drawing. Essentially I am not always TRYING to capture a specific emotion, I am trying to draw what I see, and I get very caught up in that.

-Pete

John T Quinn III said...

i think, whatever you have to lead you into the drawing is better than nothing at all. sometimes shape, sometimes a particular kind of force or energy or as in the lonely guy and emotion. you can start the drawing with "he looks lonely" but immediatley you need to ask yourself "why?" and use the drawing to answer that question and all the other questions which will surely arise as you work your way through.

he's small his shoulders are narrow-or you realise they aren't narrow he just holds himself in like that- he's small but he makes himself appear smaller-he doesn't want to be noticed or wants to be left alone, that's why his shirt bunches up like this or that... i'm making it up of course but, this is how i'm lead to the information and details. i don't add the wrinkles until i realise i need them to tell the story.