Exercise: Linear Perspective

“Red Lights Fleet Street”

For this exercise, I sketched the view from Ludgate Hill up Fleet Street in the city (just around the corner from where I work so a view I know well).  Even though at first it looks reasonably flat, the land slopes down towards Ludgate Circus crossroads and then up again in Fleet Street heading towards Aldgate and the Law Courts.

The sketch was a simple A5 sketch in black biro, trying to get a sense of the space rather than strictly following all the lines of perspective as (with so many buildings at different heights, angles and ages), all the lines do not converge at the same point anyway in this view. 

After starting this exercises, I read an article in Artists & Illustrators (October 2012 issue) by artist Andrew Hood entitled “Sketching for Abstracts”.  He stated that “it’s this very familiarity that allows me to be more expressive” so I thought this view I was very familiar with would be a good starting point to be more open and expressive.  Hood’s top tips included:

• Choose the palette you want.  Interpreting the real colours of your subject will help you personalise your work and further abstract the subject.
• Put the original sketch to one side.  The final step towards abstraction is leaving the reference material behind.

Whilst I didn’t want to fully abstract this scene, I did want to be looser as I feel the straight lines and formality of buildings can influence you to be too tight and fiddly.  And, as I had just done a monochrome sketch, I wanted to impose my own colour on this view (not a fan of beige, brown and grey at the best of times!).

I translated my A5 sketch in to an A3 line and wash drawing, using an artline pen, watercolour and oil pastel.  The drawing was completed first, exaggerating the perspective slightly to lengthen the road and give a greater sense of distance.  Before applying washes of watercolour, I used oil pastels both as a white resist (on some buildings and the vans) as well as applying blue and yellow pastels to enhance the skyline.  The paper was then wetted and watercolour dropped in, making sure left side (in shadow) was much darker than the right.  Finally, the red lights were added (cars and traffic lights) and extra red watercolour splattered on the central area.  Once dry I rubbed out some of the oil pastel with turps which left an interesting effect in the sky where the watercolour had dried around the pastel.

What I particularly like about this sketch is the bright colour of the sky contrasted with the stark black line detail of the rest of the painting and the contrasting blue/purple against the yellows used.

Even though this worked well on the cartridge paper, it has buckled a lot because of the water content, and I know it is difficult to apply acrylic / oil to paper because it soaks in so quickly (unlike watercolour which spreads very easily).  I therefore did some experiments on Georgian oil painting paper which has a much closer weave than canvas.

On this study, I firstly applied black acrylic using a filbert (very dry brush) and a twig dipped in the black acrylic, as well as a drawing pen and ink, followed by a wash of transparent purple acrylic.  Pale yellow and 2 x blue oil pastels on the skyline which I then rubbed away slightly with turps.  I then applied white oil directly to the canvas and then pulled away with a credit card (which also picked up the wet yellow underneath).  The think I felt didn’t work so well on this was that the oil pastel doesn’t resist the acrylic as well as watercolour to give the interesting mottled effect in the sky.

I approached the final painting in the same way as the sketch, applying the line drawing using the twig dipped in black acrylic to draw, followed by the oil pastel, acrylic washes and final impasto oil detail.

I really like this looseness and colour in this painting.  Using the monochrome sketch with limited detail allow me free rein to impose my own feel on the view – although some of the detail on the building is from memory anyway.

While I am pleased with the finished painting, I think the line and wash sketch has more character.  I looked at both together and decided this was mainly due to the pen drawing which is much finer and has more variety of marks.   I found it much more difficult to paint the lines with the twig than with a pen; you have much less control over the marks and the twig seemed to have a life of its own, bending in the middle sometimes to give more random lines!  Looking at it when finished, I think I should have completed more detail on the buildings on the right hand side, especially the first couple from the corner, and the area below this looks a little bare.  The buildings on the left are more successful.  Will also have to do more experiments with acrylics/oils to get more interesting backgrounds.

I like the contrast between the bright colour and white areas of blank canvas which I more or less managed to keep clean.  I think the fading away works, although I am not sure whether the buildings on the left finish a little abruptly; will think about this over the next few days and may add a few more lines.

On a technical point, I found the paper still buckled quite a lot so next time I try something with very wet paint, I will try stretching it like you do with watercolour to see if this works with oil painting paper!

In terms of perspective, the only thing I think is probably out is the first building on the right (the top should have more of an acute angle).  As I stated, even though this was a perspective exercises, I didn’t want to get too controlled with the lines/using rulers, etc, as it would then be too sterile.  And I think the painting does work in terms of a perspective exercise; the painting gives a strong sense of recession with the buildings fading away around the corner, as well as the differences in scale (cars and people).

One thing I did learn from this exercise was the benefits of line & wash (and oil pastels) for sketching.  I also have a few neocolour crayons so will try these with watercolour / line (as they are water soluble, could get some interesting results).