Hardness, resistance to covering, varnish and paint. That's what kind of measurements pencil grades are for. The humble writing implement of our childhood, beloved by teachers for ease of erase and repeat, is also one of the most versatile and necessary artistic tools, even with the influx of computer generated graphic design. In a single drop, the artist has captured an inverted mansion, the hint of an entire background trapped in a dewy branch.
What I love about pencil art is that like most things in life, its all about shades of gray, in varying intensity. You ease up here and you get trapped light, you press hard and you get scratchy darkness. And one tiny detail can change your preception about the whole damn thing.
When I was younger I used to take studio art classes. I found the long pencil strokes and the intense concentration and the silence very therapeutic. I had a problem that vexed my teachers and caused me alot of frustration and many a ripped and restarted, eventually abandoned project. I could not for the life of me draw a straight line. All my lines were beautifully, majestically curved, a great thing for round shapely objects, total disaster for angles and proportions and all the underpinnings of any piece of drawn art. Maybe it's a reflection of my life. Maybe I'm one of these girls for whom the journey is a destination in and of itself, or something god-awful and loopy like that. Better still, maybe I'm incapable of hard angles and unbending lines, maybe, just maybe, I'm a big soft arc of a girl, beginning and ending in gentle grace.
"Cat Among the Pigeons"
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