About Face! Drawing Lesson # 10

W.B. Yeats by John Singer Sargent.

I was delighted to find this dashing portrait of Yeats, by, who else, John Singer Sargent! I had no idea Sargent knew Yeats... one of my favorite painters drawing one of my favorite poets. Yeats as a young man, ardent, handsome with that sensual mouth. What woman could resist him? But one woman did....

William Butler Yeats fell in love with Maude Gonne when he was 21 years old and although he married later and had two children with his wife, Georgie Hyde-Lees, he never got over his love for Maude. Being a poet, he celebrated her loveliness (even George Berhard Shaw was astonished by her beauty) in transcendant poetry.

Maud Gonne MacBride (Irish: Maud Nic Ghoinn, Bean Mhic Giolla Bhríde, 21 December 1866 – 27 April 1953) was an English-born Irish revolutionary, ...

His last poems were about Maude Gone. How his wife must have felt, we will never know. As we would say in our time, as we get older, we all carry baggage. WB Yeats carried a suitcase full of Maude Gonne all his life..

One of Yeat’s descriptions (paraphrased) ....”Pallas Athena with that straight back and arrogant head” and ...”the fire that stirs about her, when she stirs,” God! What woman wouldn’t love to be described as such!

Here is one of his many poems about her face, and her wild spirit.

     WHEN YOU ARE OLD

        by: William Butler Yeats (1865-1939)

          W HEN you are old and grey and full of sleep,
            And nodding by the fire, take down this book,
            And slowly read, and dream of the soft look
            Your eyes had once, and of their shadows deep;

            How many loved your moments of glad grace,
            And loved your beauty with love false or true,
            But one man loved the pilgrim soul in you,
            And loved the sorrows of your changing face;

            And bending down beside the glowing bars,
            Murmur, a little sadly, how Love fled
            And paced upon the mountains overhead
            And hid his face amid a crowd of stars.

“When You Are Old” is reprinted from The Rose. W.B. Yeats. 1893.

...in old age.

Drawing Lesson 10

Leonardo DaVinci.....both drawings

Discuss reading in Drawing with the Right Side of the Brain, 3/4 view. Hand out Wyeth and DaVinci drawing. Difficulties and advantages...more interesting.... Width of different sides of face....eye is narrower and shaped differently. Nose seems wider..top and side. Mouth from center to corner is on the turned side and shaped differently from the mouth on the other side of the centerline.

Practice on DaVinci. and Wyeth drawing with colored pencil..Negative space outline...then the negative space of the farthest chunk of eye (between large neg. space and nose) Then central axis....curved...looking down , looking up ! Horizontal axis ....curve around egg (show egg and “features”) Choose a basic unit. Use it to measure distance to eye, back of ear....etc. (Show me)

Look at Escher drawing and hand out circle (Or trace a circle on your paper of at least 6") and round mirror. Prepare to draw your own self portrait in 3/4 view....but outline shadow shapes as well.Squint!

DRAW VERY LIGHTLY WITH A SHARP PENCIL!
4. Set up lamp so you will have part of your face in shadow .... Prop up mirror so you can see top of head to chin.....side of face to at least back of ear. Adjust your posture so you are in a comfortable position...don’t change this for your drawing.. Start with pg220. Look at negative shape first...note where it begins and ends on your circle format.

5. Lightly draw the negative shape on your circle (I check it) Now LIGHTLY draw the central axis of your 3/4 view....watch the angle! and “curve it around your “egg” Choose your basic unit...(show me)....I want to see you use this unit, either horizontal or vertical, for all your measurements.

6. Now lightly mark in where the horizontal axis crosses the central axis for eyes, then nose, then mouth and chin and top of head if it shows in the mirror.

7. LIGHTLY mark dots for beginning and endings of eyes, nose, mouth and ear. (I go through pg 222)
Now draw this very lightly in contour....all the shapes of your face.

8. Now SQUINT at your face and very lightly draw in all the shadow shapes. Hatch all, then cross hatch the medium and then the darkest core shadows
Try to achieve a continuous tone.