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    The Energetic Line in Figure Drawing
    The Energetic Line in Figure Drawing
    The Energetic Line in Figure Drawing
    Ebook185 pages1 hour

    The Energetic Line in Figure Drawing

    By Alon Bement

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    About this ebook

    Well-crafted and class-tested, this guide to figure drawing features a unique teaching method. It focuses on learning to draw complete figures prior to the study of individual components, and it stresses action figures rather than the customary static examples favored by most drawing and anatomy texts. Employing more text than typical art instruction books, it presents thirty figure drawing lessons and fifty-six drawings and figures. Each lesson includes detailed instructions on anatomical drawing, accompanied by visual examples of strokes, boxes, and measurements.
    Author Alon Bement taught art instruction to future art teachers at Columbia University and later founded the prestigious Maryland Institute of Art. His students included Georgia O'Keeffe, who regarded him as a mentor and major influence. Bement's nontraditional approach offers students at all levels an excellent opportunity to build their visual acuity and technical skills.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherDover Publications
    Release dateMar 5, 2014
    ISBN9780486146782
    The Energetic Line in Figure Drawing

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      Book preview

      The Energetic Line in Figure Drawing - Alon Bement

      DRAWING

      THE

      ENERGETIC LINE

      IN FIGURE DRAWING

      ALON

      BEMENT

      DOVER PUBLICATIONS, INC.

      Mineola, New York

      Bibliographical Note

      This Dover edition, first published in 2009, is an unabridged republication of the revised edition of the work, originally published by The Gregg Publishing Company, New York, in 1939 under the title Figure Construction: A Brief Treatise on Drawing the Human Figure [first publication: 1921].

      Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

      Bement, Alon, 1876–1954.

      [Figure construction.]

      The energetic line in figure drawing / Alon Bement.

      p. cm.

      This Dover edition, first published in 2009, is an unabridged republication of the revised edition of the work, originally published by The Gregg Publishing Company, New York, in 1939 under the title Figure Construction: A Brief Treatise on Drawing the Human Figure [first publication: 1921].

      ISBN-10: 0-486-47012-1

      eISBN 13: 978-0-486-14678-2

      1. Figure drawing—Technique. 2. Human figure in art. I. Title.

      NC765.B36 2009

      743.4—dc22

      2008055572

      Manufactured in the United States of America

      Dover Publications, Inc., 31 East 2nd Street, Mineola, N.Y. 11501

      WHAT IS LIFE DRAWING?

      By

      ARTHUR WESLEY DOW

      Late Professor of Fine Arts, Teachers College,

      Columbia University

      THE average artist will answer this question by saying that it is a tool of the trade. If he is bound by academic tradition he will admit that it is of first importance in art training. Many art teachers will agree with the academic artist. Others will hold that life drawing has a special, not a general, place in the scheme of art education and is, of course, necessary in certain fields, such as illustration, figure painting, portraiture, and costuming.

      Valuable service is rendered to the world by him who recognizes a need, enters upon a course of experiments to meet it, and makes public the result of his experiments. This is what Professor Bement has done, as set forth in the following pages. He has given one answer to the question at the head of this article, and has made a contribution that will be of direct and practical value to art education. It is the result of a need at Teachers College (Columbia University) of finding some method of teaching life drawing whereby the students in costume design could gain a sufficient knowledge of the human figure to meet the requirements of their craft. Many of the students were inexperienced in drawing and none of them could give the time to a professional art school drill. The regular traditional method that leaned upon anatomy, with accuracy as an aid, failed with this class of students. It was necessary to find another way. This book shows us the way.

      Accuracy in itself is not art, and to attempt to make it the aim by freehand methods is a waste of effort, except possibly for those intending to be professional artists. To most young students accuracy is practically unattainable and, even if it could be attained, its value would be doubtful, for in figure drawing the important things to appreciate are life and action. Action is expressed by the direction of the lines, and life lies in the quality of the drawn line. Life is felt; it never comes through imitation. In Japanese sketch books of the last century are line drawings of figures and animals where life and action are given by one or two lines. Children draw readily and naturally in this way—by seeing the subject as a whole. After that is realized it is easy to add details.

      Freehand drawing would progress farther if we looked upon it as expression rather than imitation. Students will draw better, if they are led to appreciate fine rhythm, good spacing, and unity in masterpieces of line, not only in drawings, but in architecture, sculpture, and pattern, and if they are encouraged to create these qualities by simple exercises with brush and pencil.

      Professor Bement has taken advantage of natural aptitudes and has called into action those creative powers that will work if we will only give them a chance. He is not proposing any short cuts, but shows that there is more than one road to excellence. His book will bring a sense of freedom and courage to many young students and should be most appreciatively received by the teachers of art.

      May 2, 1921.

      PREFACE

      The methods of drawing presented in this book are based on four assumptions:

      1.That it is easier to draw the figure in action than in the half action employed in life classes, or in the rigid bi-symmetrical attitudes shown in books of drawings and anatomy.

      2.That, except when seen from the front, the action of the body may be expressed in nearly every instance by two lines—a convex and a concave curve.

      3.That the beginner should be instructed in drawing the figure as a whole before he studies the detached parts, because drawing the detached parts first has a tendency to establish in the mind these parts in a position that is difficult to combine with the other parts of the figure when in action.

      4.That the time employed in making each stroke in a drawing should be limited, for great artists have been masters of technique, and technique presupposes skill, and skill, in turn, presupposes speed.

      We have, therefore, in the following lessons, laid great stress on the reduction of the time allowed for each stroke from the beginning. We have reversed the usual procedure, believing that the inherent good

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