Robin Cole - "Home, "Emergence," and "When They Bloom"

Home

I created this mixed media drawing from life during a wonderful artist residency at the Anderson Ranch Arts Center in Snowmass. I had quickly developed a reputation as a collector of interesting items from the natural world, and this beautiful paper wasp nest (nearly the size of a basketball!) showed up on my doorstep one day. I strung up its branch in the studio and prepared a piece of watercolor paper with layers of charcoal, ink, gouache, and dilute gesso. I has just stumbled across this toning process with a previous drawing. It creates a beautiful, earthy, textured ground, and I was excited to try it out again. The tonal color was calling to me, as I had just begun to introduce bits of subtle color into my previously monochromatic work.

 Drawing from life with no time limit offers such opportunities for diving into the nuances of turning form with light and shadow. In fact, working through this nest reminded me a bit of a cast drawing. A simple form overall, but with complex textures that I wasn’t able to capture with just black and white charcoal—I had to dip into some white gouache as well. I enjoyed the slightly ghostly feeling that this created, as the nest was really a relic: broken open by hungry birds and no longer occupied. I included a suggestion of the strings that held it in place for this reason, but also a single wasp, like a memory.

Emergence

Emergence is one of the first detailed drawings I ever attempted entirely from imagination. I am not an illustrator, so this is a practice that has always challenged and intimidated me. But I had a sense of this shape in my mind and I was eager to try it. I had very recently completed quite a number of large drawings of bird nests, and had “acquired the vocabulary” so to speak. The grassy textures and the way they bend and curve and weave together felt familiar to me at that moment in time. However, the architecture that governs their organization felt slippery, so ultimately I kept it on my studio wall for quite some time and added a few strands of grass each day. This is why the drawing is called Emergence: it’s a study in the way the whole becomes more than the sum of the parts.

This drawing is largely reductive, meaning I toned the paper with charcoal powder to achieve the deep gray of the background, then pulled out the subject with a kneaded eraser. This is a wonderful, naturally calligraphic way of drawing grasses. The overall values and edges and textures did require a good bit of editing beyond those initial marks in order to help the form turn, but it was a very enjoyable way of creating and weaving the textures.

When They Bloom 

Though this drawing is modest in size, it’s actually one of my favorites. I adore the showy, large blooms of artichokes—a rare sight, since they are so delicious to pick and eat as buds. But what I remember most about making this piece is the effortless way it came together. It is a small testament to my years of study in drawing, as just about every technical lesson I’ve learned is visibly present somewhere in this piece. I also really enjoy working on this particular surface: acrylic primer and ink washes create an organic, toned ground with a visibly granular texture.  It’s a bit laborious to coax the charcoal into submission on such a firm, smooth surface, but it offers many options including both erasing and scratching back to white, and spray varnishing to eliminate the need for glazing. It’s wonderful to be able to build up rich dark tones (sometimes a little ink is needed in addition to the charcoal) as well as crisp whites and a variety of warm and cool greys.