Sketching and Planning

Think Ceramic Artists Don’t Draw? Think again!

Ceramic artists draw all the time… in fact, drawing is very important to your success as a student of ceramics! Most artists keep sketchbooks in which they experiment with ideas and collect drawings of their environment. Some of the most famous artist sketchbooks are from:

Leonardo da Vinci. His sketchbooks are filled with drawings, diagrams and written notes of things he saw and ideas he came up with.

Picasso produced 178 sketchbooks in his lifetime. He often used his sketchbooks to explore themes and make compositional studies until he found the right idea and subject for a larger painting on canvas.

Henry Moore, sculpture artist, filled one of his sketchbooks with drawings of sheep that often wandered by the window outside his studio.

Da Vinci Sketches

Picasso Vase

Moore Sketches

Creating a plan

Brainstorming- Make a mind map or list of ideas that work with your problem at hand.

Thumbnail Sketching- small sketches that work on the basic form shape options and ideas

Annotating- add notes to (a text or diagram) giving explanation or comment.

Research

When you are going to create a work of art that may take an extended period of time, it is important that you have a good plan for your design.

Do Research:
Sometimes you may need some visual references for your project. For instance – if you want to do a sculpture Any visual images or reference materials you collect must be secured with a glue stick in your sketchbook or created digitally like in pinterest.

Documentation and Inspiration:
Make sure you are documenting all of your work.
Research must be included.
The book must reflect your work in class.
Cite all sources and number all pages!
What informs and inspires your work?
What is working?
What is not working?
Sketches, images of work in progress.
Make sure to include what you are working on in class.

Drawing

Start your Drawings:

Research. Find inspiration.
Brainstorm. Write out a list of ideas.
Draw thumbnail sketches for all your ideas.
Select a few ideas to draw larger and more detailed. Annotate while drawing.
Use color and shading to create an accurate looking drawing to what you want to create.
Document all information you want to remember (tools used, clay stages, glaze combinations, etc.)