Sustained Investigation #16

romulus

5'' x 6''

graphite, colored pencil, watercolor on drawing paper

The black rhinoceros is endangered due to poaching. Their horns are used for the ivory, medicine, and as a status symbol. I have a red line separating the horn from the rest of the face because that is where the horns are removed from. When poachers are caught, the horns are taken and burned to keep from being used or stolen again, which is why I have the red and orange background. I also noticed that a lot of African art has red, orange, and yellow in it, and the black rhino lives in Africa, so I thought it would be fitting to have my art fit in with the traditional African art.

I used HB, 2B, and 4B pencils for the rhino; I really wanted to work on the value. I used red, orange, and yellow watercolor (not namebrand) for the background. I also used the Crimson Red Prismacolor for the line along the bottom of the horn and the word 'stop'.

The first thing I did was to create a reference image in Acorn. Then I sketched it out on a smaller piece of paper and made the initial lines for the wrinkles and contours, etc. I then went in with the darker pencils and made the lines thicker and darker to emphasize certain lines in the animal's skin. I decided to not do any shading because I didn't want it to turn out silvery and I haven't done any pure contour drawings in a long time and thought I would try one for this. The background is to represent the fire that is used to burn the ivory if a poacher is caught (as mentioned above). I didn't like the original background I did, so I cut out the shape of the rhino and glued it onto a new piece of paper and then redid the text and the watercolor. I realize now that I don't really need the text, so I would definitely take that out if I were to change this project.