DOMESTIKA COURSE – ISLAMIC ART – CONTINUING WITH INK PRACTICE
Esra, our teacher, suggests we practise daily with the brush and ink. It’s a question of training one’s hand and eye and brain to get used to this unfamiliar technique until one perfects it. It is difficult! However, several days in, I think my lines are improving.
Here is the latest sheet of lines, wavy lines and various shapes. I am working exclusively with the Langnickel brush now, as it seems to work the best for me.
The next exercise is to trace various motifs, putting our line work into practice. We can download the pdfs but like with the mandala course, some of these motifs are extremely small. There are no instructions about printing them larger. I ran the first set off at the original size, and subsequent ones at a larger scale.
Over the past few days I’ve been testing different drawing instruments, because at one point I thought, “I’m never going to master this ink drawing with a brush!” The results were variable, and now I’ve had more practice, I shall continue with the brush and hope for the best. By the time we get on to outlining the final project, I should be better at it, and in the meantime I shall continue with my daily practice.
The first set of motifs to trace
Rather than using tracing paper, I am using my light panel for tracing. It is a lot quicker and less effort.
This is my first attempt at tracing the two groups of motifs at the original small size. I used a dip pen, with one of my Amazon ultra-flexible nibs. These aren’t as flexible as I thought they were going to be but they were OK for this.
This is the first set of motifs for outlining practice, enlarged. For this tracing, I used a glass pen. The results were great, but this pen is too thick for small-scale drawing.
Finally, my tracing of the original small-scale motifs, using the Langnickel brush.
I think I did OK with these. There is something about the varying thickness of the lines with the brush, which you don’t get with a pen. The motifs have a more fluid, organic and natural look. In places where the line seems ultra-thick, this is where I have just dipped the brush in the ink again. It is a good idea to do a few lines on a piece of scrap paper before going back to the drawing, to avoid this.
Using up the left-over ink
As before, I had some ink residue left in my egg cup after putting the ink back in the bottle. I diluted it with a little water – in this case, a bit too much, because it came out too light.
I painted this little picture of some trees in my watercolour sketchbook.
Because I’d diluted the ink too much, I couldn’t get enough contrast and the whole thing is a bit grey. I built up several layers, drying each one in between, and this helped a bit, but the result was a bit overworked. I thought some spatters in black and white might improve things a bit – just a bit? This picture is best seen from a distance, or with your eyes half closed!
