Snow in Silverpoint

Working in series is a common practice and one that becomes a kind of long meditation on a subject. Some artists have done amazing works in series, like Romney's series of Lady Emma or Monet's haystacks. It doesn't matter whether you're indoors or out. This winter has kept me in the studio, but the woods and creek just outside are easy subjects, and the snowy weather in January and February has lasted long enough for a small series of silverpoint drawings. The panels I've been using are all 6x8 gessoed hardboard. While they are intended as supports for painting, the gesso is hard enough and has enough tooth to allow good metalpoint marks.

The snow began in January with a heavy blanket that has lasted ever since, despite a couple of periods of warmer temperatures. The creek has run from snow and frozen solid to sometimes flowing silvery-blue on a rare sunny day. Most days have had a more diffusely flat and wintry sort of light that seems to call for silverpoint.

The first one here is a blue spruce across the creek from the studio. After asnowfall the branches hold snow for two or three days, allowing for observation and drawings like this one. This particular drawing took two or three sessions of an hour or so, mostly while snow fell, making the woods pale and foggy in the background and bringing the spruce forward in space. This particular tree has been a favorite of local deer.

A few days after the snowfalls the skies cleared a bit and the trees shed that thick covering even though the ground was still white. A different part of the woods drew my eye then, in part because of the big trunks and how one leans hard toward the creek. The weak winter sun comes from the left and trees cast faint shadows on one another. Here and there sticks and stems from summer undergrowth poke through the deep snow. Like the other, this one took a couple of hour-long sessions.

Other silverpoint drawings in this group have already been posted (see links below), but more metalpoint is in the offing.

So far, these gesso panels seem ideal supports for metalpoint. More to come.

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January
Metalpoint