Zhao Li with Ink

It was good to see her again, simply yet gracious, she posed with ease. At time candid. I hesitated to go in with colors or just black. I haven't done pure value study in a while so the question was, why not?

After the 1 minute pose warming session, we did 15min studies. There was few uninspiring poses from my point of view, I just did some hands\feets studies.

Ah Foong

You have gained 1 Level!

I would be a big fat liar if I was denying how much proud I feel after a session like this. I'm also feeling guilty about feeling this proud. Would this mean that I'm satisfying myself? This would be the most dangerous thing to happen. At least I still see thousands of things I should do better, but somehow I'm becoming less shy to show my work. Need to stay sharp, I still need that little voice ready to mock at me and punish me. So let's suck some more, and get burried into shame, and hopefully again, like a Phoenix I will reborn out of my mountain of suckiness ashes, and gain a new level! Thanks to the model, and her strong presence.

Hangover by the pool.

I was in a strange zone this morning, after a bachelor party yesterday night, and 3 hours of sleep. I wanted to to something "relax" this morning. I went out by the pool with some of my stuff. Sat there for few minutes, and started to draw without really knowing where I was heading with this. The result ended being a quick black and white study, using india ink, a nib, and small kolinsky brush. Like the sketches i did in Tokyo. I even had the patience to work the textures of the stone. I really suck at painting environment, and I think quickies like this one will give me some techniques and confidence to tackle more complex subjects.

Zen was her name, but zen she was not.

Yesterday session was akward, the model showed 1 hour late. And maybe because she felt guilty, she was kind of uncomfortable. It was just strange to draw someone, naked, who didnt want to be there. I tried to make abstraction of it but in the end that particular mood showed up in my drawing in a very particular way. Every drawing I could do, was when she couldnt make eye contact with me. Every front drawing, are just worthless. I'm feeling kinda stuck with watercolor, having difficulty to judge my improvement, I decided to do some india ink. I also tried a reese pen, and a wet brush to smear the ink for shaded area. I really enjoyed it.