abstract graphite drawing

Call – Soluble graphite on paper

Certainly on of those I don’t know whether I should call abstract, surreal, or both.

Time taken: About 4 to 6 hours. Most used supplies: Graphite aquarelle pencils, canson imagine paper, and the viarco carbon for the darker areas. A4 sized.

Most of my drawings have no meaning at all besides capturing a feeling. The reason I don’t like to explain them anymore is because the best thing about them is to see how other people interpret it. One of my teachers asked me to see it and started talking about Thoth, a egyptian god because of the bird figure. I had no idea what he was talking about.

Little abstract drawing – Night spirit

This one is called little. It’s a small drawing I did for my youtube art channel because I haven’t had much time to record.

I must say, considering how bad I usually am on creating something on smaller sheets of paper, I surprised myself!

My idea was to draw a “Night spirit”, a tiny creature facing the night sky, with a “watcher” on its back, with a moon figure, and leaf feathers.

I used both normal and soluble graphite, on fabriano bristol paper.

Abstract graphite drawing – Metamorphosis

Insects are one of my biggest art inspirations, so on the past days, I’ve been internet searching about by biggest curiosity about them. The ability to change – complete metamorphosis. But insect talk aside, lets talk about this drawing.

Most used materials: Faber castell graphite pencils, canson bristol paper, viarco watercolor graphite. I can’t scan it now because I’m not at home.

Time: 6 hours 14 minutes.

Main idea: A butterfly like creature coming out of a cocoon with based on moth wings shapes. The butterfly wings blend into another cocoon, with a big larvae inside it.

I’ve got to say, I am not pleased with the end result. The shapes on what is supposed to be a cocoon, are terribly blended with each other, specially the wings with a big black / white contrast. The composition also fails. The left side just doesn’t make any sense, specially with the terribly drawn lines, and I could not get the background as I wanted. It’s an example of how just a little thing like the top left side of the paper can ruin your whole drawing.

This is not to say I hate it. It’s just one of those times when you can see everything you did wrong right after finishing something, instead of after a week.

If you’re interested, I have an extended speed drawing version of the first 2 hours of the progress available on my youtube channel.

Whisperer

Whispering to a flower. This was a quick drawing I did to help me getting out of this art block I’ve been feeling. I haven’t had drawing ideas. Until this. A bird shadow above a mouth shaped leaf, pointing to a small flower. “Whispering”.

Initially, it was a normal A4 paper, but then I cropped it due to composition reasons. I also used a few soluble graphite.

Most used art supplies:

Faber castell graphite pencils and TK fine 0.7

Canson bristol paper

Graphite pencil drawing – Awake

Here is a question. Do you ever have a weird art idea which you can’t explain properly, because there is no explanation? You know, I was sketching last week and I thought of doing a strange eye, separated from the bottom eyelashes, with a feline inspired iris inside a round one, and a really small pupil inside it, and I was so fascinated with this weird sketch that this week I decided to do a proper drawing with it, with the upper eyelashes connected to the lines of the leaves, that are also different, and the eye between two of those, a big and a small. I don’t know why either but I drew something which is supposed to be an insect, looking at everything.

[Video]

Graphite pencils (Castell 9000 and grafwood) and sennelier graphite powder on canson bristol paper. Fixative from winsow & Newton.

Time: 6 hours 34 minutes

Graphite pencil drawing – Reading fears

I have no idea of how much time I spent trying to decide this one’s title. I thought on Crow’s spirit for some reason, then Observing (because there are 2 eyes looking at us), The fear, and some other before Reading Fears. I choose ts because this is supposed to be a creepy figure looking right at us, like it knows what we are afraid of.

I started doing this while I was on school, but then I made a break to work on other drawings, so I only came back to this one a week ago, when I went to Madeira, for short vacations, but I didn’t have much time, so I finished it here.

My goal was to create light and dark shades on the background with the graphite powder, but it didn’t work as I wanted.

On the center, there is an oddly shaped flower next to a “flame”, with an eye on the right. I wanted this to be some kind of plant, but someone told me it looked like a bird’s face, and I immediately thought on crows, because of the dark shadows. On the bottom right, there is a “melting eye” and a moth inspired shape. On the left, a leaf.

Abstract pencil drawing – Empty

[Video]

This drawing was made with graphite powder from sennelier, and graphite pencils from various brands. On the left, I drew a bird figure, and I wanted to use the powder to do the background because I am still inexperienced with it.

I called it Empty because there is only a bird there, looking nowhere. Initially, I sketched another creature, inspired by caterpillars and butterflies, which, as you can see on the speed drawing video, was looking to him, so in the beginning, this was going to be called Meeting, but I decided to hide it.

I am still exploring the possibilities of graphite powder, and these are some of the things I learned from 2 drawings:

1- Only use it after the pencil work. Otherwise, I will accidentally smudge the whole drawing, and it won’t look as smooth.

2- It’s very easily removable. I knew this before, but it’s way easier that what I thought. This needs more fixative than my normal drawings.

3- If I use the kneaded eraser to fix something and then apply the powder, it will leave an ugly mark on the paper. I’m not sure if this is because the eraser feels different when it’s warm, or because of the paper. I had to make multiple layers of powder to fix this.

Speed drawing:

Abstract pencil drawing – Shades eater

This is another bug inspired drawing, called Shades eater because of the black and white shapes on its “belly”. I gave it a large white eye to contrast it with a really dark antennae, large wings, and thin legs (these went terrible).

It’s also the first drawing where I used graphite powder. Mine, is from sennelier, and I used it do do the background.

There are some changes on my signature too. Now, I sign my works on one of the four corners with my first and last name (Lua Martins) and I sign my username (Milyusia) where I think it looks better.