These are my sketches of the bronze sculptures, placed in the setting of Pompeii’s ruins with the looming presence of Vesuvius behind. These were done using fountain pen, water, conte crayon and Faber Castell grey brush pens.
I was struck that most of these mock-mythical figures are male. Though cracked and fractured through pseudo-millennia, they are endowed with mouths and genitals. The female figures are sparse, without heads and with genitalia obscured, typically by small grotesque masks.
Pompeii forum, with the fallen Icarus (fore), with Tyndareus, father of Helen of Sparta (back)
Daedalus, father of Icarus
Ikarus and Ikaria: male and female Icarus’
Pompeii basilica: centaur
Pompeii basilica: Male and female Icarus’
Pompeii basilica: first sketches of two Icarus’
Intersection of main roads in Pompeii: winged Eros with hand.
Second century bath complex: Sulla riva grande screpolata
Columned quadrangle by the theatre: Cracked Theseus
This is quite a series! Holiday or work? Looks like you had time to choose, reflect and refine . I think my favourite is still columned quadrangle, but loving that strong yellow and the sketches of icarus. What did you think of the place?
I did a lot of drawing. Credit goes to my 9 year old daughter, who came drawing with me lots of times. It was very companionable. My son went with his mum with the guidebook so they learned much more about the place than we did. However, she now carries a sketch pad too. She didn’t actually draw but it did mean we all talked about what we saw in perhaps greater depth than we might have done.
Interesting how we’re trying to make it a natural part of our lives. For the first time, coming back from a trip, I thought I’d missed out on poking around on the seashore by sketching instead.
I love the pen wash on your ‘first Icarus sketches’, it’s so good to read how you and your dsughter are connecting over drawing.
It’s interesting how you have given life to them. I like to see artists interpreting the work of other artists and what is brought to the original in that way.
This series of drawings of ancestral art is fabulous. There is such a sense of feeling to them.
Thanks Rosie for calling by. I see you looked at other recent posts too.
These were fabulous sculptures for drawing. I went to Pompeii expecting to draw a little the ruins and perhaps the casts of the refugees overtaken by the volcanic flow but ended drawing a lot these sculptures.
I love drawing sculpture. What you left out says just as much as you put in here. (K)