THE AUTUMN SKETCHBOOK
At the first class he was asked to write comments about his drawings
to better understand the subtleties of
charcoal and the smudges
of a rubber eraser. The course description made it clear that creating from memory
was
expected and that for his final self-portrait a draft of the human skull would be
used as overlay.
The necessity
for experiment, the instructor italicized,
counted more than a student’s ability to analyze or evaluate.
Though
the human eye sees both creatively and abstractly,
most experience only the latter. That’s what his teacher had
to say
about The Basics of Drawing taught at the community college
in the suburbs of D.C.
At times
the perceptual theories copied into this sketchbook
read like a parallel history. Two points eventually refer to a third,
that being the vanishing point: From the bridge of his destroyer,
he watched ships caught in the crosshairs sink
on the Pacific.
Flares of color. Refractions, like the Crab Nebulae. Then nothing.
One Saturday in his study,
he must have decided the assignment
was more than he could manage. Bookshelves, chairs, his desk
on the red braided
rug. Rearrange a familiar grouping. Draw it.
In the sketchbook is written etc. etc. etc., etc.
replacing
any attempt at design.
Otherwise, the page, dated October 25, is blank.
After that, it was time to work
from memory. Preferably, a figure
represented by frames of action, the dimensions blocked off.
Picture a single
energy running through your subject on which all else
depends: His figures of men take root like trees.
My
father was inspired by the top shelf of the hall closet. Drawing after drawing
of his herring-bone cap and gabardine
scarf that always were there when I opened
the door; my book of poems inscribed to him tossed in with maps on the floor.
He found comfort in things above ground and inland.
He preferred whistling to speech.
By Thanksgiving
he noted the following concepts needed his attention.
More middle-tones, such as grays and lavender. Boundaries are
too distinct.
Professor says, create volume and depth as if you are sending them to a friend
who has never felt
such.
When the nude approached to sit on the table by the window,
his drawings disappear.
Confused over the difference between
the contour of a breast and its outline, he eliminates her, asking
is she
something created for (or by) my mind’s eye to express
an inexplicable . . . ?
Express is underlined
heavily, but she has gone away.
Week 12: The egg. That pink eraser has smudged the oval shell.
His chamois
and fingers are tools of softness now. The edges
still thick with rubbery dust. Scuro; dark. Chiaro: light.
New
words for the day.
Week 13: The egg grows more opulent
and cross-hatched,
its bottom like a nest in the reeds.
Notes on a visit to the museum to see Bruegel (1525-1569)
at the end of the term: Other than a few handwritten letters,
sketches, and his paintings, not much of him survives.
No contacts.
No correspondences. The implicit nature of biography, I think, deletion.
Then somehow he gets the
idea that there are few works by Bruegel
which one can look at seriously, without laughter.
Without irony, he
wrote that down.
For the final project, he had the choice of that self-portrait (15x20)
with the tracing-paper
overlay of a skull, or matting and framing
his favorite image of himself. Neither is present.
There
are several renderings of a skull.
The first, a profile, is weak-chinned and doubles as it sits on the mirror
beside
a babyfood jar.
Then the semester is over, and he’s alone drawing randomly. Brief forays
to/attempts
at Bussard Farm: Three trees. Under one a headless figure,
and weeks later a spidery pier with a boat tied to it, then
scratched out.
Scrawled in cursive below it, Too Frustrating.
A few pages later I enter, using his book—may.2004.
milepost 168.
His daughter (the name assigned to me)
listing birds
binoculars (x735):
wide-eyed vireo that mimics
cowbird lays eggs
in other’s nests
catbird a mocker
barn owl repeats its who-who’s
two short
two long diffidently
rufus towhee
drink-your-tea, drink-your-tea
rising out of the russian olive
song sparrow the best of
their kind caged and shipped
from an island across the ocean they did not
travel well
and what of the one who liked whistling better than words.
