"Astigmatic"
16"x22", Charcoal on Paper
© 2013
The second required Life Drawing portrait was to be a 3/4 view. Our instructor reminded us that we were to have some kind of "architecture" in the background by which to gage our proportions. On the blank wall behind me, using 1" wide blue tape, I taped several horizontal lines 6" apart.
I wanted to see what I would look like without wearing my glasses. Drawing oneself, for the first time ever, in a 3/4 view was challenging enough. Deciding that my image was not going to be wearing glasses was just plain hard.
I got as close to the mirror as possible. I proceeded to remove my glasses, take a quick look at my 3/4 view profile, put my glasses back on, twist around farther to my right, draw a little and then repeat the process several times. Somewhere in the process, in judging proportions against the horizontally taped lines, I elongated my features. I'm blaming that on my eyeglass-less astigmatic vision.
