I made these studies from a book I bought recently in Berlin called Earthly Bodies by photographer, Irving Penn. Penn was better known as a photographer of portraits and for his fashion work. As a young photographer he produced a little known set of photographs of the female nude as an antidote to his more commercial fashion stuff. The results were some of the most ambitious and successful nudes ever made. A set of beautifully studied photographs of the female body, unorthodox and full of powerful sexual energy they are reminiscent of Titian or Rubens. At art School one of the first things you try to learn is life drawing. The study of the human form. Like many things worth doing it can be a life’s work to perfect. There’s no real substitute to drawing from life, but drawing from the sculptured photos of Irving Penn is probably the next best thing and a good exercise in accuracy and technique. I like the final set which I put through a film grain filter on Photoshop. The first ones are untouched.
Earthly bodies
What a beautiful creation the human form is.
it sure is…..nature wins hands down when it comes to subject matter for drawing. Art imitates life but rarely or never surpasses it… 🙂