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Foundations of Drawing





As a father to a little daughter who loves to draw, engage in creative imaginative painting efforts, and altogether enjoys designing dog clothes, my interest was piqued by this fascinating book called Foundations of Drawing by Al Gury.  I was glad to receive this book and even more happy to read through the history of how drawing, illuminating, and model drawing was part of many cultures, making alive the world that we see everywhere.  Al Gury is a wise guide, holding the chair of the painting department at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in Philadelphia.  Here are a few of the most fascinating points of the book for me.

 One, Al Gury gets into the nitty gritty world of the Medieval period which book illumination and scriptoria, where monks would work at studying, copying, and translating ancient works, even works written papyrus, for their preservation.  Unique for the artistic mind, there were elegant illustrations and decorations done in pen and ink, and colored with water-based pigments.  Ornamented classic Greek and Roman works were found in these scriptoriums, devoted to the preservation of ancient texts so that others could learn and disseminate the learning of the great works of civilization.  Early Latin Bibles were produced with significant illustrations that befitted the narratives of the 66 books included in the biblical canon.

 Gury also mentions in the book the push for a national program of artistic endeavors by certain countries.  He writes, "By controlling art education and access to lucrative government commissions, the goal of these national academies was to produce professional painters and sculptors whose careers would uphold the values of the state, the academies, and their aesthetic and political goals." (22)  Many of the official academies strongly pushed classical form and closed line form rather than the more emotive and expressive philosophies such as Romanticism.  But, this was to the advantage of the both the academy and the artist in many ways, giving the artist a strong post to work from that would not be taken away by poor patron funding.

 Overall, this book was a very good introduction to the world of drawing, focusing on figures, history, method and tools.  I know my daughter as she gets older will appreciate this work.

Thanks to Blogging for Books for the copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

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