Drawing bodies in motion

Inspiration

I create drawings and paintings that capture bodies in motion. I have been working in partnership with a number of contemporary dance choreographers but primarily with Luke Brown Dance in the UK capturing dance. Ideally this work is created live in the studio with the dancers or remotely using Zoom and recorded video sessions.

Process

The aim is to capture the essence of the dancers movement and choreography. When painting in this way the mental approach is similar to the jazz musician creating improvised marks that build on each other in an intuitive way. The composition of each painting is dictated by the dance and reveals itself as the build up of flowing marks is captured. The brush or pen must move in as loose and immediate a way as possible in sympathy with the movement of the dancer. The dancers say that they see us moving in synchronisation with them. I maintain the rules of composition in the paintings so that the marks are readable in space. This requires equal negative and positive space. The images have vigour and balance in equal measure. This way of working is as far away from realist art as you can go! The marks and gestures captured by the brush must be intuitive and instinctive. Often I am not even looking at the paper as my eyes track the figure around the dance space. I do this first at the beginning of the capture then add realist clues for the eye to gravitate to thus allowing the viewers brain to make sense of the rest of the marks.
Here are my tips and tricks about how to draw the moving figure.