A Look at the Whole: Final Thoughts

After the last row was completed, I taped all nine sections up on my studio wall, and stood back to view the final for the first time as a whole. I must say I was quite struck by the scale. I knew how big the final was going to be (each panel is 20" wide), but until I saw them all in place up on the wall, the drawing didn't have a "wholeness" or sense of space.


Some other thoughts that come to mind: does the individual tiling effect add or subtract from the whole? Other than the drawing experience of working incrementally, focused on individual sections and not concentrating on the overall, is this sectional drawing method any better? And does it matter? One thing I can say is that it is a very valuable tool for me, allowing me to intently concentrate on process rather than product, and if that is the sole by-product of this exercise, then it has been valuable.

The Bottom Three

I finished off the bottom row of three in much the same manner as the others: all in one pass, working directly in colors with no under drawing, focused on each section rather than the overall. One of the byproducts of this method is the unpredictability. This can be easily seen in the lower left panel, which is noticeably out of proportion/scale with the middle panel. Interestingly, I do not find this objectionable, it lends a degree of randomness fitting the overall working method, and certainly helps me be comfortable with "happy accidents", as an instructor once called them.