Part 4, project 6, exercise 3: The face – portrait from memory or the imagination (stage 2: experimenting and finished drawing)

22 November, 2015. Initially I had only wanted to try out some mark making with my black oil pastels on very smooth brilliant white A2 sketch paper. Then I thought, oh well, I can put in something like a face to try waving the tension lines around it, then I added the computer screen to create a source of tension and then I ran wild :o). I produced the first layer with the black oil pastel stick, then added some finer and shiny lines on top of that with a 6B pencil, followed by some wide and some narrow areas of red ink intended to stand for a very serious source of tension about to strangle the man. These I moderated using a white marker and white oil pastel. I know that the last word has not been spoken in this matter and I am still incredibly angry at the portrayed person, so something went wrong with the experiment. I think that despite the strong marks the face does not convey a convincing feeling of being torn between different liabilities. Still I am happy to have drawn an imaginary face using nothing but wavy lines. Great care has to be taken when inventing a face from scratch, since it is easy to create parts which do not logically fit together, making the face look artificial. I can see some of that in my drawing and of course I have no idea whether there is a likeness to the real man in this portrait, but my subconscious may know better. If there is time, I will repeat the exercise in preparation for formal assessment.