Detail of Untitled Unfinished Drawing

Copper, silver and gold leaf, and an angel with spiked wings.



Unbelievable that this took the entire afternoon. Detail of Untitled Unfinished Drawing, 2013, Brenda Clews, 28.5cm x 42cm, 11 1/4" x 16 1/2", graphite, India ink, copper, silver and gold leaf in a Moleskine A3 Sketchbook.

Not the best lighting perhaps, but I'm tired, and took about 30 photos and this one will have to do for now.

I had intended to paint it, quite lightly so as not to disturb its quality, but looking at it on a table-top easel, and re-considering, I may only ink in the pencil lines with the grey ink the man is in. Below is the original full sketch, drawn a month ago. Paper in a Moleskine is a pale creamy yellow, as in the painting (albiet it's a bit darker but I used daylight bulbs and what you see was the closest I could get to the original), so I must have over colour-corrected the sketch.



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Pensive Woman

Drawing I did last night. Photo taken with daylight bulbs, and one of them was shining perhaps too much on the forehead since the subtle shadows there aren't quite evident enough. But no photo is perfect, is it. The colours are good.

I think I was only aiming for my obsession with people. Understanding us. [Discovered afterwards] ...imparting a quality of strength and pensiveness, a life etched in the patterns of energy that compose the world.

'Pensive Woman,' 2013, 28.5cm x 42cm, 11 1/4" x 16 1/2", graphite, conte, charcoal, pastel, coloured pencil in a Moleskine A3 Sketchbook.

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Untitled sketch in-process

Tinkering, this will become another gold leaf type drawing, sharing stages and process. Wasn't enough light when I took the photo. Pencil in my large Moleskine sketchbook. And demmit, I forgot to pick up acrylic matte medium from the art store and it's closed now.

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Mirrorless Self-Portrait, Sketch 1 final

Mirrorless Self-Portrait Series, sketch 1, final, 28.5cm x 42cm, 11 1/4" x 16 1/2", graphite, watercolour pencils, Cretacolor aquastics, copper leaf in a Moleskine A3 Sketchbook.

I wonder if hanging a monopod over the drawing lit with daylight bulbs in clamp lamps softened with white paper towels clipped on with clothes pegs (homemade lightboxes) produces a more true-to-life image?

That copper is quite dark, or quite glittery, depending on the angle of the light glancing on it.

Ok, so first, it was that my 'imagined' self-portrait wasn't realistic enough - I look younger, so I tried to correct it and simply made myself look sadder. Then it was that it was an attempt at an actual representation, so, therefore, too realistic. Sheez. Give me a break. I did this using my memory of myself, that's all. Then my daughter phones and says the eyes look so sad she can't bear it, that the sadness upsets her. So now we are in the emotive representation of the self, at last.

Yes, this sadness, determination, stick-to-it-ness is what I see in the mirror when I look at myself without any of the patinas I present to others. Sorry. It's real. My mother died 4 1/2 months ago, my kids mostly moved out (my daughter not fully but she works part-time in another city now), and I was sick with chills and a raging fever when I drew it. So what if it's sad. That's how I was feeling. 

Whether it's an accurate self-portrait, vis-a-vis anatomy and so on, I don't know. No-one who knows me has commented on this aspect. It does resemble me, yes, my daughter said. It's recognizable. But so sad! The unbearable weight of sadness.

The sadness that overwhelms, or is the core of a life's expression. My Dad had it too, that sadness. When I see the eyes here, I see my Dad's eyes.

Yet we persist.

It's a sad world in many ways. What can you do.

Maybe the next Mirrorless Self-Portrait will reveal another side, who knows.

I continue with the exercise.

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To find out what this series is about, and the constraints I set, check out the very first post.

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Mirrorless Self-Portrait Series, Sketch #1 con't...

Where this Mirrorless Self-Portrait is now. It is better to take a photograph in daylight for clarity of focus and the colours, and this is with daylight bulbs. I think it's coming along... that copper leaf is very hard to work with, but makes nice effects.

Mirrorless Self-Portrait Series, sketch 1c, 28.5cm x 42cm, 11 1/4" x 16 1/2", graphite, watercolour pencils, Cretacolor aquastics, copper leaf in a Moleskine A3 Sketchbook.

This one was taken with more sunlight than the first one. It is hard to photograph copper leaf! I'm thinking some copper grasses lower left.

A dear friend thought I made myself look younger, or at least remarked that this is how we appear in our memory of our physical self. I need to say I am not a camera; I cannot reproduce what my mind's eye 'sees'; I struggle to draw something I can live with, that's all. So of course I went back and tried to age the face, but still with the constraint of not looking in a mirror. And actually, I do recognize myself in this image, even if it's not 'perfect.' There's definitely something of the feeling of what I see when I look into a mirror, the sadness in the eyes, and an intensity.

To find out more about this series and the particular constraints I have set myself, read the first post.

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Mirrorless Self-Portrait Series, Sketch #1

I have an idea for an art series: The Mirrorless Self-Portrait. Recently I listened to an interesting podcast on CBC radio's Ideas program called, "Silver and Exact", an hour long show in which "Karen Virag explores the history and cultural significance of the mirror."

In the show, a woman described her experience of living a whole year without looking into a mirror. She described intense loneliness. Of becoming obsessed with her shadow to know she existed. It changed her; she undertook the odyssey because she wanted to look outwards more than inwards. I was fascinated.

My idea for this series is to draw or paint a portrait of myself without looking in a mirror or at a photograph.

I bought a new Moleskine A3 Sketchbook with a gift certificate my dear brother gave me. So today I began...







A sketch in the first of my 'Mirrorless Self-Portraits' Series. Not sure where I'll take it next.

... this, without looking into a mirror or at a photo. I'm intrigued by the idea of what will emerge in such a 'self-portrait.' I reminded myself, 'you wash this face every day, apply moisturizers, sometimes eyeliner, lip colour, surely you can remember the contours of your own face...' But I found myself feeling my face as I drew the way a sculptor might. It was odd, that. I tried to get the wrinkles in, I did.

Mirrorless Self-Portrait Series, sketch 1 (and detail), 28.5cm x 42cm, 11 1/4" x 16 1/2", graphite, watercolour pencils, Cretacolor aquastics, copper leaf in a Moleskine A3 Sketchbook.
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