Left Hand

Saturday, 26th February 2005
Wild West Yorkshire nature diary

I'm at a small gathering of family and friends for my mother's birthday but I don't feel like drawing the guests. People in a public place - such as on a bus, or the speakers at a meeting - I seem quite happy to draw, but guests who're at ease at a party I'm not so sure about.

There is one person here who I know doesn't mind being drawn: me.

Sitting in a rather dim corner of the room I draw several studies of my left hand; the kind of exercise I did in Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain. It's an exercise that is worth repeating.

I found the wrist the most difficult bit because it's more difficult to relate to the shapes in the rest of the hand. It's just about in proportion in the study on the left but the one below on the right got a bit elongated during the drawing.

Well, we had drunk a toast to my mum's birthday by then.

As usual, these are drawn with my Staedtler mars professional 0.7 pen. The one I take out when the light grows dim.

Richard Bell, richard@willowisland.co.uk