Drawing Class Homework

The theory that you can put your text book under your pillow at night and sleep on it and get to be a better drawer doesn't seem to work.  So I have to resort to the next idea which is to actually do the homework assignment.

The assignment is just an exercise in following line...in keeping your eyes more on the object you are sketching than on the paper. Looking back and forth.  

The purpose of the onion drawing is first to think about what the vegetable looks like and draw it from memory.  Then go and get the onion (or whatever fruit and veggie you chose) and draw what you see.  We often remember somewhat stereotyped versions of things.
Combating that illusion and drawing from what is right in front of us...drawing what we see (not what we remember) is the point of this lesson.  The pencils used in both these lessons is a Derwent graphic 2B graphite.

The assignment is using something with dark glass, draw shapes and highlights and shadows.  This is challenging for someone like me who is used to putting all those things in with watercolor!  Now I have to look solely at the pencil values.  In some cases in this drawing I had to "remove" graphite to get at the highlights.  This takes more time.  This was done on Stonehenge 100% cotton paper.

There are several more small assignments to do before next Tuesday.