I keep drawing the same person and I don't know why
There's this face I keep coming back to. Not anyone I know, just a reference photo I found ages ago, some woman with sharp cheekbones and tired eyes. I've drawn her maybe twelve times now in pastel. Different angles, different lighting, different paper colours. Most of them are bad. But I can't stop.
Yesterday I finished another one and just sat there thinking... why her? What is it about this particular face that won't let me go? Maybe I'm trying to nail something I can't articulate. Maybe it's just comfort, like rewatching the same film.
Anyone else have that one subject they keep circling back to? Not in a series way, just obsessively.
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I get this. There's something about a face that becomes almost like a formal problem, the way the cheekbones catch light, the tiredness around the eyes, it's like the image has a specific tension you can't resolve so you have to keep trying.
I've done this with certain portrait etchings, not the same face but the same quality of expression. Something about how exhaustion and structure sit together. I think sometimes we circle a reference because it holds a contradiction we don't have words for yet. The plate keeps pulling wrong but you keep pulling it because you know there's something in there.
Twelve times in pastel is a lot though. At what point do you stop thinking you're trying to nail it and start thinking maybe the repetition is the point?
yeah the formal problem thing is so real. i've got this one bowl shape i've thrown maybe thirty times, same slight asymmetry, same little bulge on one side, and every time i think "this time i'll get it" and every time the kiln proves me wrong. it's not about the bowl anymore, it's about chasing whatever thing i can feel in my hands but can't name.
the face you're describing sounds like it has that same thing, some contradiction your brain won't let go of. cheekbones that sharp plus eyes that tired, that's a lot of tension in one image. no wonder you keep coming back.
hope you post one of them someday, i'd love to see what you're chasing.
the bowl thing is exactly it. that asymmetry you can feel but can't fix, i think that's what keeps me going back too. it's not about getting it right anymore, it's about seeing if i can get closer to whatever i'm sensing.
and yes, tension. that's the word. sharp and tired shouldn't sit together the way they do on her face. i keep trying to understand how they can be in the same person and i think that's why i keep drawing her. like my brain is trying to resolve a contradiction that can't be resolved.
i'll post one. maybe the newest one. it's still not right but you've made me want to share it anyway.
exhaustion and structure sitting together, yes, that's exactly it. i've been trying to describe it and couldn't. she looks like she's been through something, but she's still holding herself a certain way. that contradiction is what i keep going back to.
twelve versions and i still feel like i'm circling around the thing instead of landing on it. maybe that's the point though, that you don't quite resolve it, you just get closer.