Week 25 of Nicolaides Challenge

Week 25. This was the final week of the challenge.

I learned a lot, my skill and artistic ability improved in ways I never expected and to the level I never thought possible in such a short time. I will try to find time and energy to do this again (maybe with paint next time) in a year or two.

I hope everyone enjoyed watching the effect of this amazing teaching method. Thank you, Kimon Nicolaides, for sharing your knowledge and for providing superb instruction to generations of aspiring artists.

Week 24 of Nicolaides Challenge

Week 24. Only 1 more week left. This week is in "oil".

Week 23 of Nicolaides Challenge

Week 23 has introduced variations into the gesture drawing exercise: straight-to-curve and subdividing the space inside of the shape of a frame. I find it fortunate that throughout the course, Kimon Nicolaides makes the student go through all the major drills, practicing each one in relative isolation, acquiring necessary skills in a relatively low-pressure environment.

It's tough practice, but it's some of the best art instruction I've had.

Week 22 of Nicolaides Challenge

Nicolaides week 22 is all about drawing with paint (or a digital oil paint brush, in my case). Everything else is almost exactly like week 21: gestures, modelled drawings, anatomy, one nude, one clothed model.

I'm also doing composition studies which I'm not showing here: they look like abstract black and white blotches.

Week 21 of Nicolaides Challenge

This is week 21 was a lot like week 20 with muscles. This week I went from contour drawing to skeletal study to muscle study.

All the work is still freehand, no analytical outlines - everything is done by "feel" and iteration.

Week 20 of Nicolaides Challenge

This is week 20.

Now that I look at it, I can see that my gestures started getting better. That is not how it felt at the time. I remember that with every passing week, it felt as if my drawings were getting worse and worse.

It's funny how thin of a line an artist in training walks between solid reality and complete delusion.

Or maybe my drawings were indeed getting worse and all I'm seeing now is my own delusion? I don't know. You be the judge.

Week 19 of Nicolaides Challenge

Week 19. Same idea as the week before. As you can see, I got tired of making things look "presentable".

More focus on the nature of what I'm observing, while trying to truthfully reflect my understanding of form and action.

From this point on, the challenge started revealing to me the difference between making a picture and drawing what I see. I finally started getting what artists were talking about when they were referring to honesty and exploring your art.

Yeah, I know it sounds pretentious. Who cares, it's the truth.

Week 18 of Nicolaides Challenge

Week 18 was heavier on anatomy and bones. The rest was modelled and gestures, as usual.

Week 17 of Nicolaides Challenge

Week 17 of Nicolaides. Gestures are now enhanced with light and dark lines: part design and  part lighting of the model. More variation in color, but still a very limited palette: it's all about developing and maintaining the sense of "touch" when observing the model.