Category Archives: Part 3 – Expanse

Assignment 3

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For this assignment I was asked to draw an outdoor scene of my choice. Unfortunately due to a global pandemic and the U.K. currently being on lockdown my only choice for an outdoor scene was my house and garden. This was disappointing for me as I would have chosen to base this assignment on a townscape as I feel this was my most successful work in this project so far.  

I started this assignment by looking back at the artists I had looked at throughout part three and I selected the works that I found could be inspirational for this assignment.

The first work being by John Virtue,

Even though the mood of this piece does not fit with the mood of my house and garden in the current sunny weather, I do like the idea of creating an effect like this style using charcoal. 

The next three artists I selected I felt were more appropriate for my house. I live in a beautiful 400 year old grade 2 listed cottage that is set  in the middle of a beautiful big garden. At this present time we are also currently experiencing beautiful weather that includes bright sunshine and blue skies.

John constables ‘The Hay Wain’ I felt showed a similar atmosphere to how I would like to portray my home. 

I love his realistic portrayal of the beautiful countryside, his use of light and shadow really make this piece atmospheric as does his use of colour in the beautiful countryside. These are skills I would really like to adopt in my own work. 

The next artist I looked at was Durers ‘The Willow Mill 1498.’ 

The reason I picked this painting is because of the tree. My garden is filled with big beautiful trees just like this one and taking inspiration from his style of working especially the way he shows light and shadow on the branches and leaves of the tree.

The next work I looked at was Monets ‘Coup de Vent’ 

I wanted to look at this work as I am inspired by Monets use of marks to show the grass and plants. I would like to somehow employ this expressive impressionist style into my own work. 

After researching these artists I began my practical work by taking some photographs of and around my house. I took these photographs on my phone, I wasn’t too concerned about getting quality photographs or compositions, I just wanted a starting point for inspiration. 

My next step was to complete some very quick drawings from a few different positions. I decided to only allow my self 60 seconds to complete each drawing so I could just focus on sketching out the basic shapes in order to think about view and composition. I gave myself 5 minutes for one of the drawings so I could include more detail. Below are my drawings: 

I then decided to complete some longer more detailed drawings. My first drawing was of the end of my house, I love this view as this is the only wall of my house made of flint, and in front of the wall I have lots of beautiful (if slightly overgrown) plants and flowers. 

I worked with a biro on a4 paper and I tried to focus on all of the small detail I could see. I also tried to catch where the light was falling. 

Below is my drawing: 

Overall I am pleased with my drawing, however I am aware that I have some areas that need improvement, the first being the flint stones, it is clear from my drawing that I lost focus as I was drawing as my flint bricks look made up and cartoony with heavy outlines and predictable shading. In future I need to be careful to observe what’s in front of me rather than getting carried away with drawing what I think things should look like. 

The other area that I found difficult was the drawing of the plants and flowers in front of the wall. I ended up drawing the flint wall then drawing the plants on top of this! This didn’t work and it ended up just looking like a mess. In order to try to reserect my drawing I added my white tipex pen to try to define the light areas of the plants. This did make my drawing look slightly more effective as it added another layer of texture to my drawing but I’m not sure it solved my problem of space between the wall and the plants. This is definitely something I need to experiment with further before beginning my final piece. 

Overall though I am relatively pleased with my drawing and I enjoyed using a biro and tipex pen. 

Before beginning another composition I decided to experiment further with drawing the plants in front of the wall. My house is surrounded by garden so whatever view point I was going to draw from this was something I know I needed to work on. 

I focussed on drawing a small area in front of the window. This time with the aim to show a clear definition between the house and the plants growing up it. I feel like I achieved this so hopefully my drawing of plants against the backdrop of my house will be more successful in the future. 

I then experimented with colour. I used watercolour and worked on top of my biro drawing. Whilst I think the colour shows a nice representation of the actual colours, it is not detailed or mixed enough to show a good realistic representation. 

For my next drawing I worked with Charcoal, this time I sat on my path in front of my house and I drew the view ahead of me. I tried to show perspective this time as perspective is something my last drawing lacked. I tried to show this particularly with the lines of the path and the tonal graduation of the tree behind the house. When shading the tree I tried to keep in mind Durers ‘The Willow Mill’ tree, I tried to consider the way he applied tone to show the foliage of the tree. 

 I also tried to show where the light was shining and show shadow across the house and roof as best as I could. 

I again really struggled with the foliage, plants and flowers in the borders either side of the path, this is something I need to work on further before I can develop my final piece.  Below are some drawings I did to experiment with these areas.

For my final piece I decided to do a more detailed and much larger drawing of this same view. I liked the fact that I could show perspective from this view and this is my favourite part of my garden. 

Before starting my drawing though I felt it was important to experiment with mark making and texture so I knew how I was going to draw areas of my garden in my final piece.  Below are some of my experiments: 

I took inspiration from Monets impressionist expressive marks when experimenting with these marks. 

For my final piece I worked a2 size and I used a black biro. I set my self up on my path in my garden and I surrounded myself with my preliminary sketches for reference. 

When I started drawing my two children kept running around me distracting my view so I decided to include them in my drawing. I drew them quickly as children of this age do not stand still for long. In my quick drawing I made lots of errors but I found I was able to work on these later on in my drawing. I felt that adding my children to my drawing just made my drawing even more personal to me. 

After drawing my children I decided to focus on my old brick path. I tried to show linear perspective by drawing the lines of the path receding onwards towards each other. 

I then experimented with mark marking and detail on the bricks on a separate piece of paper as I had overlooked this detail on my original preliminary drawing. Below are my experiments. 

I regretted working with a biro fairly soon into the drawing. I found creating large areas of tone difficult and my biro was much better suited towards creating small marks which I found tedious on such a large scale. 

Below is my final drawing:

Overall I am pleased with my drawing and upon looking back throughout my work so far on this course it is clear to me that my drawing is improving. However I am very aware that I have a long way to go before my drawing skills are competent. 

Reflection: 

Here I will reflect upon my work against the assessment criteria points. 

  1. Demonstration of technical and visual skills- materials, techniques, observational skills, visual awareness, design and compositional skills.

My drawings for this assignment show observational skills and compositional skills. I have shown an understanding of linear perspective by showing that my drawings have demonstrable depth to them. 

My depiction of light and shadow shows visual awareness and observational skills. My biro work demonstrates an understanding of that medium, the ability to create mark making and it’s restrictions. 

My charcoal work also demonstrates an understanding of the medium and how it can be used to effectively portray light and shadow. 

  1. Quality of outcome- content, application of knowledge, presentation of work in a coherent manner, discernment, conceptualisation of thoughts, communication of ideas. 

The content of my work follows the given assignment criteria. It is a drawing of an outdoor scene that includes natural objects and it demonstrates my understanding of linear perspective. It includes straight lines as well as items drawn from nature. 

I have presented my work in a logical and coherent manner whilst aiming to conceptualise my thoughts and communicate my ideas.

I tried to explain my thinking process at every step and I hope my drawings and experiments follow a logical development of ideas along with the evolution of my design process. 

  1. Demonstration of creativity- imagination, experimentation, invention, development of a personal voice.

I feel I was restricted in the initial stages of this assignment where it came to imagination as I had little choice but to draw my house and garden, this was partly due to the assessment t criteria but mainly due to lockdown and the global pandemic we are currently living through. However I hope as my project started to develop my demonstration of imagination and creativity resurfaced. My experimentation is evident throughout be it with different techniques and media’s such as photographs, work with charcoal, work with biro, experimentation with colour and tips pen. I also experimented with different techniques such as mark making. 

I experimented with my final composition by including my eldest children and focussing on much more foliage in the garden. 

As for a personal voice, I think I am focussing so much on trying to improve my actual ability to draw that maybe my personal voice is missing? I do however feel that I need to try and master the technical aspect of drawing before I focus on putting my own personal voice on my work.

  1. Context reflection- research, critical thinking. 

I have tried to show how I have been influenced by the different artists I have looked at. I have outlined it in my learning log and hopefully their influence is evident in my work. Even though I didn’t discuss these artists in great depth on my assignment I did research them in much more detail on my previous research points during part 3. 

On reflection maybe I should have made my links and influence more obvious and maybe created some more experiments in the style of these artists? 

I have tried to reflect on my work and my process in my learning log continually and I have tried to be more critical with every piece I create and every artist I look at. 

Exercise 4: Statues

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For this exercise I was asked to look for statues outside in streets, parks, cemeteries, town squares etc. 

Last summer I was on holiday in Berlin and visited the Staatliche museem zu Berlin. (The Old National Gallery.) I had read up on this exercise in advance so decided as I was there I would complete this exercise there and then. (It is a good job I did as we are currently in lockdown with the coronavirus pandemic so this would be a very difficult exercise to complete at this moment in time.) 

Below are some photographs I took of some of the statues in the museums grounds. I tried to photograph the statues from different angles and I experimented with looking up at statues and looking down on to statues. 

My first drawing is of a statue of a young strong naked woman holding a bow and arrow standing on a box.   I liked this statue as it portrays a strong woman. Often in popular culture priority is placed on women being perceived as beautiful over powerful, whereas to me this statue shows strength and power. 

On the box were the words, F. Lepcke Bogenspannerin I presume this could be the name of the artist and name of the work. 

I drew the the woman from a slight angle as I felt this was the most interesting view. 

I worked with a hb and a 2b pencil, I drew a4 size and I worked on cartridge paper. 

I completed this drawing fairly quickly as I was accompanied by my two young children. I enjoyed drawing the figure but assumed as it was still it should be easier than drawing an actual person, but I still struggled with some accuracy. Perhaps if I spent longer on my drawing reworking and reworking it could have been more accurate? 

I struggled in particularly with the feet and hands. Below is my drawing.

The next statue I drew was inside the entrance of the gallery, I didn’t note the name or artist of this piece of work. This statue was again of a woman draped in a loose fitting pants dress or piece of fabric. The woman is crouching down playing a banjo type of instrument. The sculpture is completely white and appears to be made out of marble. 

I sat on a step level to the sculpture park whilst I drew. Again like my previous drawing I felt I was unsuccessful in drawing the statues hands and feet. This time however I had longer to complete my drawing as my husband entertained my children so I strived for more accuracy. At the time I was pleased with my drawing however upon looking at it from a photograph it appears that I drew the statues neck too big. Below is my drawing,

For my last drawing I worked from a photograph (my very young children were fed up with watching me draw at this stage.) The statue I chose was at the entrance of the museum but again I didn’t take down its name or the name of the artist. The statue was high so in order to get a good photograph of it I had to step away from it and point my phone to look up towards it. This meant it appeared bigger at the bottom and appeared to get smaller the higher up it went. The statue was of what I would guess to be a father with his two young sons. I was immediately interested in this statue as I too had two young’s sons of similar age (I now have three.) 

This was a more successful drawing for me, I assume it was because I was working from a 2d photograph of the sculpture rather than the 3d sculpture itself? I did still however struggle with all of the hands and feet. Below is my drawing, 

The main thing I learnt about this exercise is that drawing hands and feet is very difficult for me and this is clearly an area I need to work on, especially for the next project which is about drawing the human figure. 

Exercise 3: A limited palette study.

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For this exercise I used my drawings from the previous exercise to develop into colour. 

I worked using coloured pencils and I used the colours orange, yellow and black. 

I worked in line first and gradually applied colour as I went. I referenced my previous sketches rather than working from first hand.

I tried to start by applying just a touch of colour by applying light pressure on my coloured pencil, then gradually increasing the pressure to try to give a stronger line and more depth. 


I struggled with this exercise, I think the main reason I struggled was because I was working from my previous line drawing rather than from life or a photograph. Because my line drawing didn’t show much tone or where the light was coming from I felt like I was almost making my drawing up. I think my end result looks flat and if I was to do this exercise again I would work from life or at the very least a photograph. 

I feel I didn’t manage to create a sense of depth with my limited colour palette and this is definitely a technique I would like to experiment further with, but in future I think drawing from source rather than a quick line drawing will hopefully be more successful. 

Exercise 2: Study of a Townscape using line.

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For this exercise I used two sketchbook pages to make a preliminary drawing of a townscape. I drew a road in Chester. I went to university in Chester a long time ago and it is a place that remains very special to me. I drew in pencil and I tried to draw everything I saw. I didn’t worry too much about making my drawing perfect I just wanted to document everything in front of me. I tried to document everything I saw except for the people. I knew if I started drawing people I would get carried away and my focus would be on the people rather than the buildings. The general mood of the place is happiness, even though it was a cold winters day the road was still vibrant and busy. 

Below is my drawing. 

For my final piece of work I was asked to complete the drawing in pen and ink. So my next stage was to experiment using this medium. 

I decided however that this time I would include people in my drawing in order to portray the true atmosphere of the location. Below are some examples of my experimental drawings using pen and ink.

I then decided to experiment with adding some colour. I used a small amount of very watery watercolour paint. I found when adding the watery paint it made the ink run and  the colour and the ink blended together. I liked this effect but didn’t really think it was suitable for this drawing so it may be a technique I experiment with further on another exercise. Below are my drawings.

For my final drawing I decided to draw a smaller section of my original drawing. I thought this smaller section would be a more interesting composition and it would allow me to draw in more detail. I worked a3 size and I used pen and ink. I tried to show through my erratic and quick marks the movement and vibrancy of the road. 

Below is my drawing.

Overall I am pleased with my drawing. I feel like I have captured the energy and feel of the location. I feel that using pen and ink was the perfect medium in which to achieve this too. 

My areas of improvement for my work would be some of my accuracy’s, proportions and perspective lines. When I focus on different areas of my drawing especially some of the windows I notice how some of my angles are out slightly and this in turn makes areas of my drawing look wrong. 

I am hoping that with time and practice this is something I can improve upon. 

Exercise 1: Sketchbook of townscape drawings.

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For this exercise I was asked to focus on a townscape. I decided to concentrate on Reading town as this is my closest town. I focussed on one view of a set of three buildings attached together down a quiet road in Reading. I positioned myself on a chair and table outside Starbucks. 

The buildings I drew were a row of cafes, with what look like residential apartments above them. 

My sense of the place, was mainly that it was a bit dirty, I was cold, and the cafes didn’t look like places I wanted to buy coffee from. 

The buildings looked old and worn, they looked like they could do with a re paint as paint was peeling from the wall. The street itself was busy though and lively with a happy atmosphere of people getting on with their day. 

I started this exercise by making a detailed study with a 3B pencil, in a 10cm square. I focussed on one of the windows above the cafe. I picked the grottiest looking window as I felt this gave the most atmosphere. It made me wonder what was behind the dirty glass and ragged curtain? I started the drawing by drawing the outline- I tried to draw in all the detail like a blue print before adding tone just like urban landscape artist Nathan Walsh whom I studied in my research point before this exercise. 

I used a ruler so I could get the lines of perspective correct. (like I was taught in a previous exercise.) 

Below is my drawing: 


I then drew a second 10cm drawing only this time I focussed on shadow. I picked a different window & a different part of the building this time. I tried to show where the light fell across the building. The light and shadow was not that strong but I still managed to see the shadow. I again used a ruler but drew some lines of perspective wrong & it impacted the entire drawing. Luckily though as I was using a pencil this could be amended. 

Below is my work: 

When deciding on drawing these buildings I didn’t put much thought into it, it just so happened that I was facing this way when sat at my table in Starbucks. However when drawing and really focusing on every small aspect and detail of these buildings, I really started to appreciate how spectacular they actually were. I noticed every small detail of exciting architecture. Or every small dirty pipe or mark on the wall. 

My next stage was to make several more drawings so I was able to make a more informed decision about my final piece. This helped me as it forced me to observe details I would ordinarily miss when just looking. I drew a bigger area than my original 10cm square drawings and I continued to work with pencil. Below are my drawings. 

I then experimented with colour, I drew in biro first then added a wash of watercolour over the top. 

After my work with colour I decided not to use colour for my final piece and to just draw in tone.

My next drawing was of a bigger area, as I felt my drawings with more detail and surface area were more successful. I worked in biro this time as I was starting to find that my pencil work was getting a bit smudgy. Because I was drawing a larger area I noticed that I was missing out detail and being more selective about what detail I was including. For example I left out people- I knew that including the people would be difficult as everyone was moving so fast and I didn’t want to get wrapped up in trying to draw people rather than concentrating on the buildings. I also left out things like piping and litter on the floor and lettering on the windows and actual lettering for the signs. 

Below is my drawing,

This drawing I decided was going to be used as my composition for my final piece. I love the angles at which the building is facing and how my drawing really conjures up the atmosphere of the place at that given moment. 

For my final piece I decided to work big- A2 size. Drawing big is something I struggle with so I wanted to practice. I decided to work with biro as I knew I would end up smudging my pencil work. 

I wanted to take my time with this drawing and use a ruler to work out perspective and I wanted to draw out my drawing like a blue print with as much detail as possible before I added tone like urban artist Nathan Walsh. I found getting all the angles right very difficult and because I was using a biro my incorrect lines had to stay. 

Below is my detailed line drawing. 

I then began to add tone with my biro. This helped with my incorrect lines as I could ‘tone’ over them. I discovered as I was drawing how much detail I was leaving out. I only included one person, right at the edge of the work. In hindsight I wish I included more people to show the busyness of this street. 

I really struggled with all of the angles and lines that were needed in order to make this drawing look accurate. Whilst I was successful in lots of these lines and angles there are a few that are incorrect that distract me from the finished piece. 

Overall I am really pleased with my drawing. I am mostly pleased with my tonal work and I am very pleased with lots of my lines and angles. 

Research point 8: Urban Environments

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For this research point I was asked to look at urban environment landscapes. I started by looking at John Virtue and the work he produced while associate artist in residence at the National Gallery between 2003 and 2005.

John Virtue is a landscape artist whose drawings look almost abstract. He often works from the landscape of where he happens to be living at the time, in this case it was London. 

John Virtue works in black and white. He uses acrylic paint, black ink and shellac and works on canvas.

John Virtues London Paintings focus on the London skyline, where he often showed popular landmarks such as St Paul’s Cathedral.

Below is one example of his works from this time, landscape no. 664 

Art UK. (2020) Landscape No.664 John Virtue. At: https://artuk.org/discover/artworks/landscape-no-664-29490 (Accessed 16/04/2020).

This is a landscape drawing of a view along the river Thames. It shows a view of St Paul’s Cathedral and Blackfriars Bridge. At first these are the only two aspects of London I recognised, and the rest appeared to me like a vast amount of blackness. However over time and really looking that this image I began to notice other elements such as the boats on the river. 

I find his drawings really emphasise the hazy and smoggy side of London, he shows this through his rich over use of black, and his works almost smudgy abstract appearance. I love the subtlety’s of his detail and the extravagant mood and atmosphere he manages to portray. 

The next artist I looked at was Nathan Walsh. Nathan Walsh is an English artist who paints ultra realistic urban landscapes. One of the reasons I chose to look at him was because of his use of perspective in his work as this is what I have been studying recently. 

Below is an example of his work: 

Nathan Walsh’s Unusual Urban Landscapes Painted Atop Precise Graphite Sketches

Walsh often exhibits his detailed line drawings alongside his final paintings. It is obvious from these drawings that he firstly establishes his horizon line and then works with lines of perspective from there (exactly how this course has so far taught us to do.) 

I love how his final pieces show a mixture of ultra photo realism and an illustrative element, for example the puddles on the pavement could be a photograph whereas the tree in the centre looks like an illustrative drawing. 

The next artist I decided to look at was Craig McPherson. Craig McPherson is known for his urban landscape paintings of New York City. Below is an example of one of his works,

Craig Mcphearson (2020.) Yankee Stadium at Night. At: http://craigmcpherson.net/mezzotints/Yankee-Stadium-at-Night-detail.html (Accessed 16/04/2020).

One of the reasons I chose to look at Craig McPherson’s work, was it showed striking similarities to John Virtues black and white paintings. However rather than using Acrylic paint and ink like John Virtue, Craig McPherson uses mezzotint, a type of print method used with copper or steel plates. This is a process I have never used before or even heard of so it was something I found exciting and fascinating. 

I was really inspired by Craig McPherson’s Yankee Stadium at night. I love his use of vivid light and the amazing atmospheric perspective that is shown. (This is something I failed to achieve successfully in my own work on my previous exercise, so is a technique I am very interested in now.

I feel his work is very dramatic and I love it’s vast composition. Unlike John Virtues work Craig McPhersons detail is sharp and obvious. This works makes my eye travel around the piece at great speed it feels like I can’t get enough of every tiny aspect quick enough. 

In conclusion all three artists show wildly different styles and techniques whilst still maintaining an exciting portrayal of urban landscapes. Moving forward I would like to be able to use their work to inspire my own drawings including John Virtues use of mood and atmosphere, Nathan Walsh’s incredible detail and realism and

Craig McPherson’s use of atmospheric perspective. 

Bibliography:

The National Gallery. (2020) John Virtue. At: https://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/learning/associate-artist-scheme/john-virtue (Accessed 16/04/2020).

Wikipedia. (2020) John Virtue. At: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Virtue (Accessed 16/04/2020).

Schama, S. (2005) This is London in all its rain-sodden, beery-eyed, nervy exhilaration. At: https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2005/feb/28/art (Accessed 16/04/2020).

Yale Centre for British Art (2020) John Virtue. At: https://britishart.yale.edu/exhibitions/london-john-virtue (Accessed 16/04/2020).

Art UK. (2020) Landscape No.664 John Virtue. At: https://artuk.org/discover/artworks/landscape-no-664-29490 (Accessed 16/04/2020).

Exercise 3: Aerial or atmospheric perspective.

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The objective of this exercise was to create a sense of distance through aerial or atmospheric perspective in order to show that distant objects appear less distinct. I was to do this using tonal graduation.

I was asked to use a selection of drawing media, I used Charcoal and watercolour paint, Indian ink and water soluble crayons. 

For this exercise I worked from old holiday photographs of landscapes that I considered to be quite beautiful. Due to the current pandemic working first hand will prove to be quite difficult. 

For my first drawing I worked with charcoal, I tried to establish the horizon before plotting the basic forms of objects in the landscape from foreground to mid and far distance. My aim was for my foreground to appear sharper and darker and my background to have less detail and be lighter. Below is my drawing.

I felt that my drawing was not complete so I continued my drawing by adding watercolour paint. I made sure that the sky and hills in the background were light and dull with very little detail whilst all the colour intensity and detail was focussed on the trees in the foreground. 

I feel I could have emphasised atmospheric perspective further by having the background hills even lighter and even duller. 

For my next drawing I worked with Indian ink and an old fountain pen. I found using ink quite a difficult media to use when trying to show distance, especially the background. I used mark making to show texture and detail in the fore and middle grounds and left the background clear, my idea being to add water to the drawing to smudge the ink in order to create some atmospheric perspective. Below is my original ink drawing before adding water. 

When I added water rather than show the atmospheric perspective I was hoping for I think I just managed to create a bit of a mess. I experimented for a while with this drawing adding more water and then working on top with more ink after it dried. 
Below is my work. 

I don’t really feel I managed to show much atmospheric perspective here, mostly because I was not confident enough with the media I was using, I enjoyed being experimental though and hopefully next time my work with ink will be more successful. 

For my final drawing I used water soluble crayons, I started my work by blocking on the basic forms of my objects (in this case trees & bushes) then I gradually built up gone and colour, focussing on making the fore & middle grounds more intense with colour whilst leaving the background quite pale in comparison. Below is my work

Overall I feel I learnt a lot from this exercise. Even though what I feel I learnt is not necessary evident in my work, I do feel hopeful that in my next drawings I can work upon this technique of showing distance and atmospheric perspective through tonal graduation.

Exercise 2: Angular Perspective.

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For this drawing, I drew a scene from Reading town centre. I picked a building that I could observe corner on. I used biro on thick cartridge paper and I worked a4 size. I tried to use every possible vertical or horizontal reference to ensure that receding lines were drawn at the correct angles. I tried to use the vertical corner of the building as the reference. 


Below is my drawing: 

When I finished my drawing I stuck together 4 pieces of a4 tracing paper and placed it on top of my drawing. I then drew all the parallel lines and tried to get them to meet their vanishing points.

I found using a ruler to check the angles and receding lines very effective in helping my perspective and accuracy of my drawings, this I see definitely a technique I intend to use going forward on all of my drawings.

Exercise 1: Parallel perspective- an interior view

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For this exercise I was asked to draw a view through a doorway inside a building. I was fairly limited to where I could do this as we are currently on lockdown & I live in quite a small house. I decided to do my drawing at the entrance of my kitchen. I chose my kitchen because of the wood panels on my floor and the angular cupboards and table and chairs. I positioned myself on the floor to draw. 

I drew in line and didn’t use a ruler. I drew on a3 paper in my sketchbook with a hb penciI. 

After I finished my drawing I put tracing paper over the top of my drawing and drew over my parallel lines (mostly of the floor & sofa) using a biro to see if they all receded into a single vanishing point. Unfortunately they met in a variety of places. (I did make the mistake of adding lines of the sofa which was positioned at a different angle!) I then added the lines (pink) of the fridge and storage cupboards, this again showed similar results.

My next step was do the drawing again, only this time using a ruler and making sure all of my lines receded into a single vanishing point. Below is my ruler drawing: 

This drawing is a lot more accurate than my original drawing, thus using a ruler and making sure all diagonal lines receded to the same point worked effectively. However this drawing feels more clinical than my first and seems to lack the charm of my original. 

Exercise 2: Foreground, Middle ground and Background.

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For this exercise I choose a photograph from my Aunts back garden, I used this garden for my previous exercise on 360 studies. 

I worked a3 size on white cartridge paper and used a selection of different pencils. 
The aim of this exercise was to establish a foreground, middle ground and background. 
The photo I chose from my Aunts garden I felt showed this effectively

This way of organising space is characteristic of the French classical painters Nicholas Poussin and Claude Lorrain who in turn influenced the British landscape artist JMW Turner.

Nicolas Poussin Landscape with a Calm, 1650–1651

Claude Lorrain

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claude_Lorrain

JMW Turner Italian Landscape with Bridge and Tower, 1827.

All of these landscape paintings show foreground, middle ground and background effectively, their common traits are mostly blurry backgrounds and much sharper foregrounds. This is something I am going to aim to do in my work. 

I started my drawing by doing a line drawing of my photograph. I then started to add tone to the background, I worked with my softest 6b pencil and and aimed for very little detail, I then worked into my middle ground where I used my 2b pencil and aimed for slightly more detail, then for my foreground I used my sharpest HB pencil, I tried to focus on small detail with this part and used cross hatching and mark making to show tone.

Whilst working I felt like I was succeeding in this exercise, however when I finished I noticed that it wasn’t actually as obvious as I thought or would have liked? One problem I had whilst drawing was I was constantly smudging my work unintentionally with my hand whilst moving my pencil around the paper? I think in future maybe I should rest my hand on a piece of material or paper to try to prevent this smudging? 

I also think in future I need to make the foreground, middle ground and background even more obvious. I believe this drawing would be more effective if I made all of the background completely blurry, then the middle ground less so and the fore ground extremely sharp. 

I feel I have gained a lot from this exercise. Even though my drawing is not as obvious as I would like it to be, my subtle differences do show a small element of space and this is something I will continue to work on and think about in my future work.