On Drawing
The sketchbook assignment -- draw an animal, live or stuffed. At first I thought of going to a museum where I might find some accurate replicas . I imagined myself drawing a wooly mammoth or saber toothed tiger.
Growing up in New York City I often visited the American Museum of Natural History. I still recall the Hall of African Mammals where the artists who constructed the dioramas used molds of leaves and bark to increase the accuracy of the landscape.
The display of dinosaurs captured my imagination. I remember one scene of a meat eating dinosaur attacking a herbivore.
Instead of selecting a museum where my drawing skills might garner the attention of a group of school age children, I chose to draw a local animal.
A small herd of Belted Galloway cows reside on a farm two towns away. Growing up in a city, my experience with cows falls on the limited side of the scale. I like the cows I encounter on Ben & Jerry ads.
I thought that Galloways might be easier to draw since they have a distinctive belt of white around their midsection. Some people refer to them as Oreo cows.
No matter how many times I erased the face and redrew the face it never resembled a cow's face. At first it had a human look and later on it took on the likes of a large dog's face. One ear did come close to looking bovine.
The body, I thought, came closer to a cow like contour although the hoofs turned out to look like spats. In fact on close examination the cow appeared to wear trousers.
I think I'd do better drawing a mouse or a ladybug.
Growing up in New York City I often visited the American Museum of Natural History. I still recall the Hall of African Mammals where the artists who constructed the dioramas used molds of leaves and bark to increase the accuracy of the landscape.
The display of dinosaurs captured my imagination. I remember one scene of a meat eating dinosaur attacking a herbivore.
Instead of selecting a museum where my drawing skills might garner the attention of a group of school age children, I chose to draw a local animal.
A small herd of Belted Galloway cows reside on a farm two towns away. Growing up in a city, my experience with cows falls on the limited side of the scale. I like the cows I encounter on Ben & Jerry ads.
I thought that Galloways might be easier to draw since they have a distinctive belt of white around their midsection. Some people refer to them as Oreo cows.
No matter how many times I erased the face and redrew the face it never resembled a cow's face. At first it had a human look and later on it took on the likes of a large dog's face. One ear did come close to looking bovine.
The body, I thought, came closer to a cow like contour although the hoofs turned out to look like spats. In fact on close examination the cow appeared to wear trousers.
I think I'd do better drawing a mouse or a ladybug.
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