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Jeffrey Carson Admiring a Portrait Bust
Post #1497 • January 17, 2012, 11:38 AM • 5 Comments
![[Image: Jeffrey Carson Admiring a Portrait Bust, January 12, 2012, ink on paper, from the sketchbook]](http://www.artblog.net/static/posts/2012/01/carson/carson.jpg)
Jeffrey Carson Admiring a Portrait Bust, January 12, 2012, ink on paper, from the sketchbook
Every few years the astonishingly erudite instructor of art history and writing at the Aegean Center for the Fine Arts comes to America and invites former students to meet him at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Carson, who has led tours of Aegean Center students in Italy and Greece for many years, thus gave us the ultimate tour of The Renaissance Portrait from Donatello to Bellini, which, for the record, is exquisite.
Greetings to the new friends I made that day. If you took pictures or drew, send me images and I'll post them here.
2.
January 17, 2012, 3:24 PM
Yes, you do have a knack for capturing personality with very simple means. I meant to comment on that about the batch of wash drawings you put up a while ago but I didn't get around to it.
I also think the varied values of the inks is very effective and could work into a real system of value layering.
3.
January 17, 2012, 7:29 PM
I had noticed the same as Darby regarding the varied ink values without knowing that I noticed. Make sense? To me, this is what makes the depiction of Jeffrey more successful than the bust. Jeffrey seems to come alive whereas the bust seems stone cold stagnant. Which it is, so maybe that was intentional (being almost completely outlined). I've not noticed the varied values in your previous drawings, but I'm interested in seeing more and if it develops into a full-fledged system like Darby suggests.
4.
January 17, 2012, 10:50 PM
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5.
January 19, 2012, 9:07 PM
Seamus, thank you.
Darby and J.T., in a way, it already is a system, albeit not a very smart one: first guesses with the light ink, and second guesses with the dark ink. Really what's on my mind these days is turning it into a system for oil painting.
Drew, those are beautiful—thanks for sending.
1.
Seamus Heffernan
January 17, 2012, 12:04 PM
How you managed to capture every ounce of that man's immense essence with so few brushstrokes is making my head hurt. Goddamn brilliant, Franklin. And how I wish I could have been there.