Printmaking 1

First of three taster sessions on printmaking - a chance to develop ideas and get a feel for whether this could be something to do more of: "go into it with a totally open mind and don't worry about the outcome".

And start filling those sketchbooks -- these are devoted entirely to hair, and are amazing - holes in all the pages as well, intensely worked - "this is where the fun happens" -

After a morning of introduction and looking at slides of various types of prints and the diversity of possibilities, off we went to the National Gallery to collect some ideas (and have some fun).
Now that it's been pedestrianised, the area between the National Gallery and Trafalgar Square has filled up with buskers. When these break dancers got going, the crowd got larger and larger. In the centre rear of the photo, you can see the famous Fourth Plinth, with its current temporary sculpture looking like a bit of spring greenery. It's too late to apply to become part of Anthony Gormley's sculpture (people standing on the plinth for an hour at a time, 24 hours a day) - and it seems the organisers of the project haven't applied for planning permission for that yet.

Inside, in the newest part of the gallery, the grand entrance hall, all was serene -
Meanwhile we got out out sketchbooks and "collected ideas" for a couple of hours. I'm trying to get out of my comfort zone, so brought along some colour, including (argh) felt-tips. The first room I went in had wonderfully glowing gold-orange damask fabric on the walls - and a guard with hair to match, and a red face to match the walls of the room beyond. And at first I found the viewers more interesting than the paintings.

The felt tips were useful for Europa and the bull by Guido Reni (before 1640) - and then I tried to simplify the painting -- ok, doing this does get you looking at it in a different way - and that's one of the objects of the entire drawing exercise --

Of course the felt-tips bleed right through the paper, so I started on the clean page on seeing Pietro Longhi's rhinoceros (1751) - the hatted, masked figures have always intrigued me. Doing the simplified drawing led to looking at the faces/masks only -

and to faces and other bits of visible flesh in other pictures, looking at the rhythm and spacing of those areas.

Over in a corner was a small group of schoolkids, being told about Constable's view of Salisbury Cathedral across the meadows. The museum teacher was excellent, and the kids were interested and asking good questions - and eager to do so -

Here's my "fresh view" of Longhi's fortune teller

The lovely girl's chaperone (or is it a chaperone?) is dressed in black and wearing one of those scary, pointy-nosed white masks - they're called volto or larva masks. The whole Venice-carnival-masks thing puts me off rather, but there's something intriguing about this one.

By the way the pictures on the National Gallery's website can be made larger by selecting "image only" when they come up with a description - and they also have a Zoom possibility for a good look at details. And the pictures on Wikipedia, if you click to enlarge them, tell you about their copyright status.