What the!
Yes, it’s a spray bottle wearing a pair of glasses.
I get paid for thinking up stuff like this.
Let me explain. This exercise combines two topics: perspective and profile. In the previous class we had worked on the topic of perspective. Nothing elaborate, just one-point and two-point perspective, using architectural images to find the vanishing points. For our purposes in 
this drawing class, perspective is not crucial, but it’s a useful tool. It comes in handy, for example, when you draw a face in three-quarter view. The eye farther away from the viewer (the one behind the bridge of the nose) will be smaller than the eye closer to you. That farther-away eye is tricky to draw, so we didn’t even go there. It’s enough to just get the point of diminished size. And to get that across, I set a pair of glasses on a spray bottle, one combo for each student.
Notice, that the perspective in the glasses is exaggerated in these drawings, according to my instruction. Students are universally reluctant to exaggerate anything for the simple reason that they want to draw what they see. Fine. But to add drama and to make a point, you need to summon the courage to exaggerate. Add that to the lesson in perspective and profile.
All in all, a profitable class. Initially, eyebrows were raised at the goofy sight of spray bottles wearing glasses. Then followed the challenge of getting all the elements together, representationally and technically. The motif only works if the drawing technique is fairly precise and the object is shown 
matter-of-factly and in its entirety. This is why one student found it necessary to add a strip of paper at the bottom of her initial sheet. A fourth lesson learned: it’s ok to do this, if you run out of paper, just tape on an addition.
I have since learned that one of these drawings has been framed and hung in a law office.
Do this at home: grab a spray bottle, put your glasses on it, reflect on the complexity of reading a face. See? Not goofy at all.
(To enlarge, click on image.)
All contents copyright (C) 2010 Katherine Hilden. All rights reserved.
artamaze by Katherine Hilden 
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