It may surprise some of you to hear the time that was spent in drawing the figure before beginning to paint.
The model used to sit for six consecutive days: from seven to twelve in summer, and from eight to one in winter, and an hour was allowed every day for intervals of rest.
During the whole first day’s sitting, nothing but drawing was done. Sometimes the shades of the figure were rubbed in with bitumen or some transparent brown, but no color was ever used. The master would come early on the Tuesday, and until he had passed, as it were, every student’s drawing, no one who studied seriously would think of laying on color. Six hours, therefore, out of the twenty-four were spent before the actual painting began; but, at any rate, good solid foundations had been laid: well-proportioned and carefully drawn figures were the rule and not the exception, and if the student had not time to finish his work by the end of the week, he would have at any rate a large portion of the figure carefully studied.
When a figure is well drawn, the master will take a pleasure in giving the student some hints about the color, and will perhaps take the palette himself; but to give instruction in color when there is no drawing, is like furnishing a house before the walls are built.
I have noticed that some of you in the life school attach too much importance to the mere outline, and neglect the structure and internal markings of your figures. Now the bones and principal markings of a figure are of infinitely more consequence than the outline; it is they which give the action and proportion, and in every stage of figure-drawing they should be accurately and clearly defined, to serve as landmarks from which the outline may be mapped out. If you were drawing a head, you would not trace a sharp outline of the hair, ears, and cheeks, without having first indicated the position of the eyes, nose, and mouth. Why then should you proceed on a different principle in drawing a figure?
There is another bad habit of drawing which has of late become too common in the schools, and which I, as visitor, have often protested against; and that is the practice of blackening the figure all over, with the intention of working out the details with breadcrumb or the eraser. It maybe that this is the most expeditious way of producing a smoothly-finished drawing, but I am sure it is not the most artistic way.
An Academy figure should be drawn on the same principle that a ship is built. If you visit a ship-builder’s yard you will see vessels in all stages of progress, but the future character and destination of each are discernible almost from the first laying down of the keel. You can tell at a glance whether the future vessel is to be a clipper yacht, a collier brig, or a barge. If you revisit the yard a month or two afterward, you will find great progress. The builder has got the planking on, but the vessels have retained their original form. In another month, perhaps, they will be found decked, caulked, coppered, and ready for launching; but they have never lost the original lines given them.
So it should be with your Academy figures. They will, of course, be less complete on the third and fourth days than on the ninth or tenth; but in no stage of their progress should they present the formless, hopeless appearance they too often do.
Let me hasten to add that this inartistic way of drawing (though too common here) is not universal, and that those who have chosen the better path will find the benefit of it hereafter.
I will now proceed to give you a few words of advice about figure-drawing after you have left the schools and are painting pictures of your own.