Turtles

this is the story of turtles. in 2001 I raised my left knee up and placed my hand down on it, fingers spread, and wrist aimed squarely at my eye and started sketching in ballpoint pen (and underrated medium). this was left turtle 1 (to be posted as soon as I can find it). I liked the pose, so I did it several more times. I called them "Left Turtles" because it was my left hand, and they looked like turtles, with the wrist the shell, the middle finger the head, and the other fingers it's legs. above we see attempt number two, this time in charcoal. I got a decent tone with it, but I think parts came out a bit flat. it looks almost as though it were a piece of paper folded to create a semi-3d.







for Left Turtle 3 I used ink and chinese brush. I kinda let myself go, and sketched with a quickness. this I was also unhappy with. it's rough, but rough is fine with me. but this roughness was not an interesting roughness to me. and having been so rehearsed I began losing control of scale and proportion. basically I was starting to get bored. the pinky is also not visible in this, as it was not in the the pose of my hand that time. each of these was drawn from a new pose.







my fourth attempt carries over some of the same problems as the third, and expands upon them. in charcoal again, I this time toned the paper with vine charcoal and started by gouging out the highlights with a moldable eraser as I was taught, and then shaded the rest with compressed charcoal, avoiding reliance on contour lines. I have to say I'm quite proud of the light/shadow on this one. I got the dimensionality right on this one, but again the proportion is totally fucked.







back again to the chinese brush, this time I was really getting fatigued with the whole idea, and it shows. proportion is all off, the ringfinger is bulbous and ungainly. the roughness is more jarring and even less interesting. not a success.







attempt six. desperately trying to breathe new life into my inspiration I decided to draw on black with white ink. my hatched highlighting on the forearm was problematic, and I countinued to screw up the ring finger. but overall I think it looks decent as a n image.







finally I was watching TV on the couch and decided to sketch a turtle on a board in pencil and carve it out for woodcut prints. I did a very simple and rudimentary line drawing, and then carved out out the shading freehand. success! the print was to be re-dubbed "Right Turtle", as it became a mirror image once printed. I experimented with different techniques for the print process and post-printing:







using dampened paper...







and going over it with water and a brush, to name a couple.








finally I carved lines into the background of the block to create the penultimate version.












and then a few years later I xeroxed it and when over it with a sharpie to fix any of the remaining roughness to create a clean, final version to be used in whichever context the rougness does not play well:





and that is the story of turtles.