Gathering Art Work for a Portfolio

Lately, I've been working on putting a portfolio of my recent work together. I'm doing this because I'm visiting fine art schools in the east coast. I want to apply to graduate schools to earn an MFA (Masters of Fine Arts).

It's not easy picking twenty of my best pieces for a portfolio. I like my work, I am proud of it, so looking through my drawings and paintings from the last couple years to pick the best work has been tough.

Here are two older pieces that caught my eye: I like the fresh sketch feeling these two drawings have, and I thought they were nice pieces. I think I draw so much that perhaps I get immune to my drawings and get caught up in the production and technical part of it that I don't see the beauty in my work. It's not until I have set it aside, forgotten about it, then later revisit my work that I say "Wow! what a beautiful piece, did I really do that?" I think that's when I truly enjoy my work.

So what schools am I interested in? There are a lot of schools with impressive programs. Two I want to really visit are NYAA (New York Academy of Art) and PAFA (Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Art). Impressive programs, I'm looking forward to touring the schools and talking to the faculty and students soon.

CLICK IMAGE TO ENLARGE, GRAPHITE ON PAPER 14" x 17"

Plantain & Pears Sketch

Hi, I haven't posted in a long time. I've been busy working on illustration projects, surfing and working at local SurfSchoolPuertoRico.com and SurfCampPR.net. it's been fun, tiring, and I now have a nice tan :). Here's a sketch i created a couple days ago to get into the still life drawing mode. I'm right now drawing portrait illustrations for a client so last night I was inspired to visited cousins to draw their portraits, it was fun, they got a kick out of me drawing quick sketches of them. I'll prep and post them soon on this blog. Hope everyone is well, keep in touch.

Cheers,

Bernard Garcia

Figure Drawing of Large Woman

Last night's evening figure drawing session was challenging. I like it when this person models because I can feel my drawing concentration intensifying. When ever I draw her I realize how easy it is for me to sketch the petite female models we've had in the past.

Lately I've been drawing the full figure with all my figure drawings. I remember when I used to focus my drawing on certain part of the pose, but now I draw the figure within the edges of the page. i like this because It forces me to make proportion measurements, its more challenging, and I believe drawing the full figure every time makes my drawing skills and technique progress evenly.

I created several drawings at this session and they all came out nice. I chose these two to post, the drawing on the top left is a 5 minute pose and the drawing on the right is a 40 minute pose. I started with a gesture drawing to help me quickly block in the shapes of the model, I made proportion measurements, and sketched in the negative shapes. I also sketched in the chair to help me with proportions and to add depth and perspective to my drawing.

I had a great session, the evening weather was pleasant, a good company of artists attended, and the boom box played classical music for the 1st half and Nils Lofgren for the 2nd half.

Portrait sketch & drawing of my friend Adrian

I attended the Saturday morning drawing group and my friend AJ was modeling again. This time I feel I created a nice drawing that captures AJ's true likeness. It's never 100% exact but it's what I try to achieve with my drawing style.

I made a couple drawings and I picked these three to post. The drawing on the left took me about 40 minutes to create. Then I created the two quick sketches on the right, about 8-10 minutes each. I wish I had more time to complete these but I like them because you can see my method for drawing a portrait. I quickly sketch the light lines that are horizontal and vertical to help me align features of the face to slowly achieve the likeness I'm looking for.

You can also see circles or ovals, I use them as short cuts to add tone or highlights. I sketch the ovals to quickly block in areas of the portrait that change in gradation. The lamp that provides the light is coming from above so I may quickly sketch an oval on the highlighted area and not add any tone. On the side of the face and bottom, the tone is changing so I'll quickly add ovals with crosshatch lines as tone to block in those areas.

I also add ovals to create a surface plane, giving a feeling of depth. Notice ovals are different from top to bottom, I try to draw them in perspective.

I'm happy with these drawings, I had a good session. A lot of artist showed up, and the jukebox played good music: James Taylor, and Irish fiddle music, which always takes me back to the Pacific North West :).

Reclining Female Nude Figure drawing

WOW! I just returned from an awesome figure drawing session! I was definitely in the zone and created some really nice drawings. I don't know what it was about this drawing session; the good weather, or the nice music, or the fantastic model, or all three, but I felt focused and was having a good time. Plus they played nice Classical music and Irish music.

The session was started with several 5 minute poses, which were all wonderful poses, full of energy and emotion. The 5 minute poses really warmed me up and set my mind straight for the long poses. I was able to complete three drawings with the long pose and here is one of them. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do. I'm still feeling fired up :)

Bust Drawing - Guitar Player Man

Here's another drawing I created at The Toledo Portrait Artist Group, Saturday mornings 9am-12pm. They hire two models for 4 weekends giving the artists plenty of time to complete a painting. Next Saturday will be the model's last posing session. I'll miss the guitar player, he plays good James Taylor tunes.

When I attend portrait sessions, I enjoy creating drawings of the models. Some of the members use paint, some use charcoal, but I like using a sharp Ebony pencil and Strathmore drawing paper, I feel these two mediums help me develop better drawing skills quickly. Plus I like pencil and paper because I can set up fast, move around the model easily and I can often finish several pieces in one session.

I've really enjoyed drawing the guitar player. This Saturday I decided to sketch him from straight on and it was more difficult then I thought. It was a challenge to draw the hands, guitar and face proportionally on one page. I finished at the tail end of the session, with not enough time to start a new drawing so I sketched a quick profile of the model on the right side of this drawing.

Portrait Drawing - Male Guitar Player

I attended a portrait drawing session this morning, I had a great time and completed this nice piece. I decided to position my
Strathmore Drawing Paper Pad in portrait position as opposed to landscape because I wanted to draw the head and hands bigger.

I used Ebony graphite pencils. The model sits for 20-minute sessions before breaks.

1. In 1st 20-minutes, I began with quick gesture drawing of head and hands to make sure both elements were going to fit. Then I sketched in head.
   
2. In 2nd 20-minutes, I started sketching the hands.
3. In 3rd and 4th 20-minutes, I worked on detailing both head and hands and building the contrast.

This was the result. I'm happy with it. O ya, I forgot to mention I created this piece while listening to good country music :)