CRUMB FOREST SKETCHES

Here's a few forest drawings by Robert Crumb. The thing that catches your eye about them is the detail. Most artists simplify forest scenes, but not Crumb. He loves the busy, mysterious tangle of it all, and crams as much of it in as he can.

That's a good way to go. Our whole delight in seeing forests is that they're so wonderfully different than how we'd organize the world.  They're the mysterious "other." They're packed with dimly understood life and a hint of some grand message that's just beyond our reach.

Here's (above) what looks like the dried up bed of a stream. You have to wonder where those rocks came from.  How do little creeks manage to pile up heavy rocks like that? Flash floods could do it. Maybe the whole area is as rocky as the stream bed but the other stones were covered up with soil and plants.

Here's (above) a mysterious path through the boulders which leads to a dark, leafy tunnel and a bright, sunlit area beyond. What a delight!

Here (above) a space in the rocks reveals a magic carpet full of fascinating detail way, way down low at the ground level.  It's as if nature had set aside an exhibition of  treasure, but put it on the damp and shadowy ground rather than on a rock or a table.  It's hard to resist the idea that we've stumbled into an area that was meant to be enjoyed by small creatures, and not giants like ourselves.


It's odd how forests just abruptly stop and make way for clearings of grass. The stump looks cut and there's no fallen tree, so the pesky interference of man is evident here.

Isn't it amazing that a guy who's famous for his big city drawings would be so good at sketching nature?

  

WHAT TO DRAW WHEN SKETCHBOOKING

These quick sketches are terrible but they're good enough to make the point that I have in mind, which is that most people draw the wrong thing when they go out sketchbooking.

If you draw people as individuals you'll end up as often as not with cliches: the middle-aged guy with a gut, the fat woman wearing tight clothes, the guy nodding off while he tries to read his newspaper, etc. That's because ordinary people people look pathetic when you draw them in isolation. They're glazed over from shopping or working. Your catching them at their worst.

Where people come alive is in conversation. That's where they become psychological and fleshed out. Take the fat woman. When she's talking she's no longer just a stereotype, she's a human being with a point to get across. She's more interesting.

Now the problem with this is that but people don't stay still when they talk. You have to draw your memory of what they looked like, which is hard, and an instant later you're diverted by the next pose. It's not a good way to turn out pretty drawings, but if you're lucky you might capture an interesting moment.

DELACROIX'S SKETCHBOOK

Made during his visit to Morocco in 1832. From an artbook: "Illustrated letters."