Urban Influences 15-30 drawings

For my 15 drawings, I really wanted to investigate and explore the idea of urban scenery. So, I took my camera around Manchester taking photographs of the architecture and the cultural streets. I began my investigation by looking at an artist called Wayne Thiebaud (http://www.artnet.com/artists/wayne-thiebaud/). I was really interested in how he is able to change the perspective of a landscape and I am inspired by his use of colour. Colour in my work is usually very bright and bold and he also uses bright colours. I am interested in the way he uses colour and incorporates it into his drawings, making certain parts of his drawings highlighted.

I found that when creating my drawings from my photographs, that when I spent a lot of time on one drawing, it seemed to be neater and more organised. However, the majority of my drawings were constructed over a short amount of time. These drawings also seemed more expressive and conceptual. I like creating drawings under a short amount of time as they tend to exude character and help me to create lines that I usually would not create if I was to spend longer time on the drawing. I feel this is one of my strongest drawings out of the 15 and it is interesting that I did not spend a great deal of time on it, using only a black marker pen. This is a drawing of a street with a fire escape stairway attached to the building. I like the way I have taken a photograph and created something that does not look like the image itself, but has some similarities. This reflects back to Wayne Thiebaud’s work and how he is able to change the landscape and make it into something completely different. I think I need to develop my colour palette in my work as I think I am restricting myself slightly to use colours that I am more used to using.

Some of my strongest work is when I used a black fine liner and added water to the drawing to let it bleed on the page changing the whole concept of the drawing and giving it texture. For the development of my work, I want to create more fine line drawings and adding water to the piece as I liked how the black ink merges into different blues, greys and blacks when adding water. I also want to look at viewpoint in my drawings and create drawings looking from a perspective of someone looking at building or a piece of architecture.