Albrecht Dürer - The Great Master

Don´t all pupils of great master try to emulate them? But do they get it right, that is the vital question? Most don´t. I will be shooting to fit into the group that gets it right. Not right to the extent of being able to forge art work, but rather get the techniques right. I think that I have a long way to go, because understanding the techniques is not the same as being able to use them successfully. However, practice makes perfect. Having completed only a little over 1 month, and with still 11 months ahead, I have become to wonder if there will be enough copies of the masters out there to copy. Take a look at the oeuvre of Michelangelo, he destroyed a lot of his own work, and of that that remains, many educated professionals don´t agree as to which is his or not. There are only about 600 works that the Pros more or less agree upon. Jokes aside: there is more than enough to keep me copying for the rest of my life. To all those out in the big wide world - have a jolly good weekend.

Recycled paper

The problem of doing sketches on recycled paper is that sometimes, actually more times than not, at the very end of doing the drawing, one notices a small mark one can not rub out, only to find that it is embedded in the damn paper. No matter how careful I have been in examining the paper before hand, it still seems to creep upon me and bite me in the ass.

Copy, Copy, Copy and Copy the work of the masters

No, this is not a self portrait, it is a copy of one of my favorite artists works: Albrecht Dürer. The idea of copying so much of his works, is that I hope that some of his techniques and knowledge will rub off onto me.

Gentile Bellini

I don´t know much about this artist, basically nothing so I had to look him up, and this is what I found: Gentile was born into a family of renowned painters: his father Jacopo Bellini, was a Venetian pioneer in the use of oil paint as an artistic medium; his acclaimed brother was Giovanni Bellini, and his brother-in-law Andrea Mantegna. He was christened Gentile after Jacopo's master, Gentile da Fabriano. Gentile was taught painting in the workshop of his father. Although today Gentile is often seen in the shadow of his more famous family members, in his own time he was considered among the greatest living painters in Venice and had no shortage of commissions; his talent as a portraitist revealed itself at an early age.

Copy of Albrecht Dürer

Another day, another copy. This is the work of Albrecht Durer, and if you ask me on very ugly portrait. But credit has to be given when due: he did a damn fine job of the drawing. In this copy the yellow background is dry pastel, the rest is normal pencil on recycled paper.

No models

The experts tell me that this drawing was originally done purely by the artists knowledge of the human body. They knew that when a person stood in that way, which muscles were evident and visible. No models were used for these poses, apparently. I added in the flourishing around the drawing. Done with a traditional dip pen on almost white paper.

Leonardo da Vinci

This original was not done by Leonardo da Vinci, but one of his pupils. I spent a lot of time on the face only to find out later that I had not left room on the paper for the rest of the head. Not planning out the position of everything before doing the details, was not a good idea. I should have known better, but one can becomes so engrossed with what you are doing, and at the same time knowing that I should have paid more attention to the layout first. Still, at the same time thinking that I do not need to worry about it, it will work out in the end - then CRASH - Not enough room. Lesson taught again - follow the procedures!

Summer - Pieter Bruegel

Every artist has what he considers to be the best drawing he/she has done, and this one, to date, I think is my best. It is a copy a section of Pieter Bruegel drawing called "Summer". Originally it was done with pen and brown ink, but I coloured a few sections with some pencils. What do you think about the man´s shorts, they were designed with a ball-bag? Imagine if you saw someone today wearing pants like that?

Michelangelo copy and interpretation

A copy of none other than Michelangelo' work, with a blue pencil background. At least this drawing was better than yesterday's.

Copy & alteration

When Michelangelo drew this originally he did not pencil in the background with a coloured pencil, or what?

Copy of Copies - A Dürer

I hate to admit it, but this is not one of my favorites, I do not think that it was one of my best. Drawing done with normal pencil and coloured pencils . But all haul, Albrecht Dürer.

Copy Michelangelo again

This take on one of Michelangel´s work is taken from a drawing he did of Cleopatra. He made many similar drawings of the woman with accessories such as head dressing and scarves. Most of the drawings were done with proportions of the ideal beauty of Venice of that time. The original (there are many that dispute the originality of this piece) was done with black chalk.

Copy Michelangelo

Once again this is a copy of Michelangelo's work. I wonder if I always have to say that these drawings are a copy? Besides this being a copy there is the added colour done with pastels. Hope you are having a very pleasant day!

Michelangelo - Another of his great works

Oh no, not again - another drawing from the master Michelangelo! Yes it is a copy done with graphite on recycled paper. Doubt very much if they had recycled paper in those days. Probably paper in those days was a precious commodity.

Another day, another drawing

Doing a drawing a day from the masters is not all that easy, especially when each of them have their own technique. The type of drawing that I find most difficult to do are those that have been done with red chalk, a type of dry pastel. So I thought that conté would work well, only to discover that it is a pretty unforgiving medium. Once you have made a mark with it, it leaves a permanent mark on the paper, not like graphite or vine charcoal. But, the results are very striking provided that you got the drawing correct.

The master Michelangelo

Yes, this is anther copy of one of the great master´s oeuvre. The word oeuvre: the works of a writer, painter, or the like, taken as a whole. The origin being french. But it is a word that I have not been able to pronounce.

Faith

Oh ye with little faith, thought I would not be able to get one drawing out today! Well, I'm glad to prove you wrong, after a very difficult day I still managed to churn one out, so how about that. I promised one per day for a year and I will do my best to copy a master.

Micheleangelo drawing

This is a personalized copy of one of Michelangelo's drawings. At the time of him doing it, naturally there was no colour background. Hope you like it.

Michelangelo

This image to copy was very enjoyable. The original by Michelangelo was done with red chalk, so one of these days I will have to get some and have a go at it.

Rubens again

Once again a copy of Rubens work. I did not think I gave him justice with this drawing, the face is not very much like the original. Probably will have another go at this image in the future. Anyway, I suppose that, not everything that an artist does is always good, not that I'm saying my work is good. What I meant was, I was not entirely happy with this attempt, as I was with some of the others, but then I'm never totally happy with anything that I do. When I look at the result the next day, I always see room for improvement, its like an addition, I'm always looking for the perfect result or "High"

Michelangelo

Once again, my copy and interpretation of one of Michelangelo's works. Thanks to the great master of art for his contribution to the world. I used graphite and dry pastels on recycled paper.

This is a copy of one of the works of Albrecht Dürer. I did this with graphite and chalk on recycled paper. Yesterday I read something that I thought was very interesting. A lot of people post on the internet, various philosophies on how to live your life that are very cheesy. But one appealed to me for a change. It was: Life is like a piano, there are black and white keys that represent the bad times and the good times respectively. But taking that idea a little further: It depends on how and who plays that piano, that produces a wonderful or disasters tune. Those that practice playing will eventually play life well, and those that shy away from playing will bang out a bad tune. Do you practice your piano/life so your family, friends and you hear a tune that is beautiful and worth while listening to?

Raffeallo

This is another drawing of Raffaello Sanzio that I copied, but unfortunately I did not have the whole image to copy. If anyone has a copy of the complete drawing please let me know.

Raffaello

Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino born April 6 or March 28, 1483 and died April 6, 1520, better known simply as Raphael, was an Italian painter and architect of the High Renaissance. His work is admired for its clarity of form and ease of composition and for its visual achievement of the Neoplatonic ideal of human grandeur. Together with Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci, he forms the traditional trinity of great masters of that period. Although this image might not be known by many, at least the name Raffeal hopefully would be.

Peter Paul Rubens - Child

Once again, another drawing copied from the oeuvre of Rubens. Setting myself the goal of copying a drawing of one of the old masters is starting to take its toll. But I will not give up, Soon I will start doing some copies of some of my other mentors. Michelangelo and Durer. Found another great artist on the net yesterday: Adonna Khare. Have a look at here webpage: http://www.adonnak.com

Rubens

This copy is another drawing by Rubens. I'm coming up to 2 weeks of drawings and have been stuck by the enormity of my project and the flaws. If I have to do a drawing per day for year, what will happen if I fall sick or want to go on leave, or worse: a internet connection failure? Well I'll just have to tyry and solve those problems as they arise.

Woman with towel (Rubens)

This artist is without a doubt one of my favorite artists: Rubens. Rubens was born 28 June 1577 in Siegen, Germany, to Jan Rubens and Maria Pypelincks. In copying this image I hope I have done justice to one of the most gifted artist the world has ever seen.

Pieter Bruegel

This copy I made was from the artist Pieter Bruegel (Brueghel) the Elder. (Born 1525 – died 9 September 1569) was a Flemish Renaissance painter and printmaker known for his landscapes and peasant scenes (so called genre painting). He is sometimes referred to as the "Peasant Bruegel" to distinguish him from other members of the Brueghel dynasty, but he is also the one generally meant when the context does not make clear which Brueghel is being referred to. From 1559 he dropped the 'h' from his name and signed his paintings as Bruegel. I drew this with graphite on recycled grey paper.

Poet Lady

This drawing is of a very austere looking woman just before she was about to do a poetry reading. This a black and white photo taken from Life Magazine. They provide the best photos to use for artist drawing exercises. This was done graphite on recycled paper.

Michaelangelo

This artist needs no introduction, and is always a good teacher. Copying his art teaches one so much about artistic techniques. There is a work that I wish could be applied to the body of work of an artist. The word is PHYSIOGNOMY: the ability the read the character of a person purely by their outward appearance, principally from the face. I wish I had the ability to read any famous art's character from looking at his or her oeuvre.