Resources on Memory Drawing
In my previous post on memory drawing, I mentioned the book The Training of the Memory in Art written by Horace Lecoq de Boisbaudran in 1847. It is out-of-print but good ol’ Google Books pulled through and made this rare find easily available online.
Another great resource on drawing from memory is also now available here. Drawing from memory: The Cavé method for learning to draw from memory, written by Marie Elisabeth Blavet Cavé. Here’s a portrait of Madame Cavé, painted by Ingres, from The Met’s permanent collection:
Cavé portrait, by Ingres
The first line of the book starts out with the sentence,
“This is the only method of drawing which really teaches anything.”
I can’t say I fully agree that it’s the only method of drawing that teaches one how to draw, but it certainly shouldn’t sit on the bench. Hours, weeks, months and years of learning how to draw accurately from direct observation has been immensely helpful (and frustrating at times); it has really helped me train my eye. Drawing from memory on the other hand helps me test my knowledge and thus has helped me train my mind.
On a side note, I think that this is also why I find the sculpture and ecorche classes that I’m taking with Steve Perkins so helpful. Besides the fact that working from 3D to 3D has allowed me to really understand the form, masses, rhythm and structure of the human body more directly, Perkins’ rare knowledge of the forms and masses and how he presents this information works to build up my memory of the figure. I find that I am able to store this information of patterns in a simple way – I think of it as a diagrammatic, yet organic, hierarchical filing system. But I digress…
Both books describe wonderful and fun exercises in how to test your observational memory. We have a 4-week long pose this month and after spending this last week on compositional studies and a drawing study, I begin the underdrawing/painting this coming week. I plan to test myself with this month’s pose by trying out a drawing from memory next weekend.
I’d love to follow-up with a memory sketch in clay, but I’ll see how the drawing goes first. I imagine the 3D version will only stand a chance if I really understand the pose from a structural construct rather than a purely optical/shape approach. The prospect of finding out how much I possibly don’t know about about a pose I spend 80 hours on is a scary thought…but I guess I should find out sooner than never. I’ll post both memory sketches (2D and 3D) over the next two weeks.
