BARBARA FUGATE Drawings And Paintings

Day Four of Making "Making Our Way": Three More Days to Go

As my Grandmother would say, "my dogs are tired!"  Today was another 14 hour day of creating MAKING OUR WAY. 

Many thanks to my multiple models who posed for me with all that charcoal dust literally everywhere.  They all focused and worked with me seemingly without a thought about it!  What great folks they are--creative, fun, talented, amazing people.

Here are the SNEAK PEEKS at Making Our Way after today's journey.
Come back again tomorrow for more to come...Thanks for visiting.
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Day Three of Making "Making Our Way": Four More Days to Go

This morning I woke up to even greater empathy for what Michelangelo must have felt like when painting the Sistine Chapel--bent like a bow reaching up above his head.  Ouch.  I was so stiff this morning from my long day of "Making Our Way" yesterday that I squeezed in a yoga practice this morning in hopes that it would loosen me up and clear the mind.  It definitely helped.

Things are beginning to happen in "Making Our Way"...there are many figures inhabiting the walls now...so the procession is really starting to move!  Creating a room that functions like a drawing/painting--composition, rhythm, relationships, and Form is a challenge indeed.  Here are a few photos of today's progress...and a couple of my models too.

Thanks for visiting and taking a sneak peek at the installation--more will be posted tomorrow night!  Click on images for larger versions. 

Day Two of Making "Making Our Way": Five More Days to Go

Two of my models (mother and daughter) DREW ME DRAWING today!  I asked permission and here their works are--what fun!

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Today was a full day of MAKING OUR WAY--around ten hours I think.  I had five models, three of which are a family I have had the pleasure of drawing (each of them) for at least 12 years!  Their daughter (in the photos below) I drew while still inside her mother, and she's 12 now.  Since it was Mother's Day today, drawing Mother and Daughter together added a special touch to my day of drawing.  Many thanks to all my models today--to great collaborations!

Here's the "sneak peek pictures" for today.  Remember, the unveiling is May 16th.  Thank you for visiting. (click on images for larger versions)

Day One of Making "Making Our Way": Six More Days to Go

Today I started creating MAKING OUR WAY, my drawing installation on the walls of  Steele Gallery at Seattle's Gage Academy.  This morning as I faced all those white walls with my charcoal in one hand and sketches in another, I realized I was in my very own state of possibility!  Anything and Everything is Possible at that point--one of my most favorite moments of painting or drawing--that instant before the mark-making begins.  I take a big breath and start scratching, scraping, scrubbing around allowing my marks to begin the journey.

I'll post a few details from the walls of MAKING OUR WAY each day this week as it progresses--a Sneak Peek before the opening night on May 16th!

MAKING OUR WAY is a large procession through a tiny room.  From May 16th to June 13th the intimate, chapel-like space of Gage Academy's Steele Gallery will be filled floor to ceiling, with drawings made directly on the walls of life-sized figures processing out of an atmosphere of fear into the realm of possibility.  Redolent with dynamic and impassioned images, my installation piece is raised into a greater state of joy by the voice of soprano, Lucia Neare, during the opening reception on May 16th.

Thanks for visiting.

Getting Ready for MAKING OUR WAY

This afternoon I was able to spend a few hours at Woodland Park Zoo in Seattle--drawing in preparation for my installation MAKING OUR WAY where I'll draw directly on the walls of Steele Gallery at Gage Academy.  I have five days to create the installation, including elephants and people in a "Procession of Possibility"--beginning this Saturday.  I'm planning on posting details of the installation each day as I work on it--so visit again if you'd like some "sneak peeks" of the piece (May 10th through May 15th).  The opening reception is May 16th from 6-8 pm.

Here are the drawings I made today.  They are mostly of Bamboo, an Asian Elephant born in 1967 in Thailand.  Bamboo arrived at Woodland Park Zoo in 1968--only one year old. 

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After Bamboo was allowed into the Elephant barn for the evening, I visited the "Willawong Station" where parakeets and other birds of Australia circle around your head, feet, hands--freely flying all around you.  I love going there to warm up and study marks that "fly".

Come See: Seattle First Thursday, May 1, performance piece: Ooo La La

If you're in Seattle--don't miss this performance piece.  I've helped make some of the props and I will be in the piece as well.  It's amazing, magical, fun, and very beautiful.  Bring lots of friends!

May 1, 2008
Harbor Steps in Downtown Seattle
6:00 pm - 8:00 pm

On May 1, get swept off your feet with Ooo La La, a free interactive public performance spectacular!

"Created by Lucia Neare & coinciding with First Thursday ArtWalk, Ooo La La creates a grand corridor of whimsy throughtout downtown. Follow the parade from Occidental Square, or board the Queen May at 6 pm on the Harbor Steps as she sets sail to Whimsy.  Music, dancing and suprises await throughout the evening." Go to www.LuciaNeare.org for more information and images.

INSTALLATION in MAY

MAKING OUR WAY is a large procession through a tiny room.  From May 16th to June 13th the intimate, chapel-like space of Gage Academy's Steele Gallery will be filled floor to ceiling, with drawings made directly on the walls of life-sized figures processing out of an atmosphere of fear into the realm of possibility.  Redolent with dynamic and impassioned images, my installation piece is raised into a greater state of joy by the voice of soprano, Lucia Neare, during the opening reception on May 16th. 

Please come view and enjoy and experience Possibility. 
Opening Reception is May 16 from 6-8PM; Performance begins at 7PM.
Steele Gallery, Gage Academy of Art :  1501 10th Ave E, Seattle WA 

Drawing from life last night...

A selection from last night's life drawing session at my studio. 
24x36" pastel, ink wash and watercolor.  Email me for purchase price. Thanks for your visit. 
Click on image for a larger version.

See my ART WORKSHOP OFFERINGS (scroll down to a previous post). 

Expressive Figure Drawing and another on Gesture Painting this month of April. 

There's space for registrations in both.

Drawing again at the Roman Show at SAM

Today I went back to the Roman Show at SAM as a part of my preparations for two big projects I'm working on (one of which will open MAY 16th at Gage Academy in Seattle titled, Making Our Way). 
I started wondering why I was drawing there with my feet hurting from standing on the hard floor and constantly dodging people from backing into me (oblivious as they listen to their exhibition-phones) or breathing over my shoulder... A few of my reasons "why": the statuary is a way to plump up my drawing skills, confirm connections with other figurative artists from years ago (although their works are timeless really), meditate, open up, and/or consider ways to communicate ideas via poses, attributes and so on.  It's puzzling sometimes, though.  Overall, I really just like drawing and drawing from Greco Roman stuff. 
Today as I was drawing, each statue somehow kept coming to "life" as I drew them, heading off into directions other than what I first perceived and probably far from the original intent.  In any case, I love it when that happens and I try my best to let it flow.

Here are a few I made today on green-gray paper, 12"x9" with conte crayon pencil.

Thanks for visiting!  The works are all available for purchase--just email me for pricing, etc.  Click on images for larger versions.

Images:
Ceres (she's a glorious thing), Augustus, Unknown Woman, Head of Isis

Roman Show at Seattle Art Museum

Yesterday I visited the Seattle Art Museum's exhibition of Roman Art from the Louvre.  It's amazing to have so many of the Louvre's collection here in Seattle.  Each gallery of the exhibition space is painted a different saturated color that was great to show off the white marble--and allow us to see the subtle color variations and textures of the busts, figures, and bas reliefs.

Here are some drawings I made from the pieces.  Drawing from statuary, for me, is not at all a study of light or copying in any sense.  As you can see from my sketches, they're my reaction to that piece in terms of mark making (we're allowed only "pencils" in the museum)--an energetic reaction, a spacial relationship reaction, a reaction to how that Form exists in space at that time for me.

My favorite quote posted on one of the gallery walls:
As soon as one sees with one's own eyes the whole which one had Hitherto only known in fragments and chaotically, a new life begins.  (Goethe, Italian Journey, Nov. 1, 1786)

Sketches are 9" x 6.5", conte crayon on acid free paper.  They're all available for purchase, just email me for pricing.