In this chapter we’re diving into the world of reportage illustration. The range of reportage illustration types is as vast as the range topics one can choose from to write about in any given publication. We will only be focusing on the following: illustrating in the courtroom, at special events, fashion, architecture, botany, and travel.

Reporting is observing one’s surroundings and recording them for the benefit of others. The best place to start is probably one’s immediate vicinity.

The local fortress in my hometown is both familiar and close by. The structure houses a church and the historical museum as well as small restaurants and rooms often rented out for local events. It is not a large fortress, but the green space within its walls serve as a pleasant park to spend time in when the sun is out. People can be found strolling about, many times with children. In the summer people will occasionally rent out the space for outdoor concerts or other such events.

The current structure was raised around 1602-1652. It replaces the original fortress built around 1492 which was destroyed during the invasion of Giorgio Basta.

The first time I went to the fortress to draw I focused on the building itself, or at least one of its bastions and its walls. I can sketch fairly quickly, but even so the cold weather made it difficult to stay unmoving for longer periods of time, so I came home with three drawings (or four if one counts the failed sketch). But after coming home and photographing the images, I realized that I had done very little to capture a sense of place. The drawings were informative in the sense that they showed the form of the structure and some of the foliage around it, but they said nothing about the atmosphere or the people or even gave a look into the park inside.

So I needed to go back on a different day to make more drawings, this time changing my approach. By this time I had also completed some of the next exercises and had noticed that I have a tendency to ignore the people when drawing in public in favor of drawing buildings or trees. Whether this is because drawing people in motion is always difficult or because I still find drawing strangers awkward I am not sure, but this time I forced myself to include people in the sketches. The drawings also show more of the park and the glass dome. I was there from just before the sun started to set until the golden hour (when I took the photographs), I tried to depict the atmosphere of the park at sunset as well as I could.

Teenagers on the fortress wall

Street food stands

The colors had to be finished at home, again because of the cold, but I like to think that the results are better for it. The colors just look so much more harmonious, even if the paper is not best suited for watercolor and therefore the results are not necessarily my best work.

Family walking past the restaurant (the musical note at the left just shows that I could hear the radio from said restaurant)

Sunset

Franklin Mc Mahon (1921-2012) was a twentieth century illustrator most known for his work in reporting. As an artist, he was allowed to record events visually where cameras were not allowed. His courtroom sketches specifically made him one of the most notable artists of both then and now. The sketches below are from the famous Emmett Till case in 1955 which attracted more reporters than any other case at the time or until then. The outcomes of the decisions made that day still affect many people in the US today.

Courtroom Montage,

1955, ink and wash on paper

Below we can see the way Mc Mahon has captured the people taking part of that courtroom. His lines are precise and dynamic, more concerned with capturing expression, characterization and the mood of that moment in time than thoroughly correct proportions or even clean drawings. We can see this in both the sketches of Mrs. Bryant and her lawyer and the ones of Emmett Till. The lawyer is drawn twice over almost the same spot, but in different positions, giving him an impression of movement, like he stood up to speak with Mrs. Bryant, who is obviously reluctant and uncomfortable by her hunched pose and downward gaze. Willy Reed (later changing his name to Louis for his own protection) on the other hand is expressive, his portrait is drawn thrice on the same page, perhaps in the very moment when he testified against Emmett Till’s murderers.

In the drawing with the hats, Mc Mahon brings a day to day element to the table. The mundane detail of a row of hats grounds the nation-wide drama into reality.

The Courtroom Montage was probably not drawn in the moment of the trial (note the different materials and paper). Mc Mahon used the on-site sketches to make a more finished and better composed illustration.

Two Men and Hanging Hats,

1955, pencil on paper

I love the idea of drawing people in action, a suspenseful scene, of capturing truth as I see it while it’s happening and adding to the narrative. Mc Mahon’s work definitely does capture a small window of that enormous event. A photograph is effective and always appreciated in reporting, but there is something special about the personal nature of a drawing, and the focus on emotion it grants the viewer.

I was apprehensive when I read what I needed to do for this exercise since it requires that I report on an event. Events are rather difficult to come by these days, but I was fortunate because the city allowed a 1st of March market which I was able to go to.

March 1st or “martisor” is a celebration of the beginning of spring. The tradition is old and its origin is debatable, some say the Romans brought it to the Dacians when they started colonizing, others say that they already had the tradition before they came. It is likely that both hold truth as spring celebrations are popular everywhere the weather starts getting warmer and greener after a long winter season.

The tradition is to either make or purchase a thin braided cord made of two strings: one white and one red. The white string representing the winter and the red representing vitality. There are several myths regarding the martisor but a popular one is that the sun came on earth in the form of a maiden who was kidnaped by a terrible dragon. A young warrior saw it happen and searched for her an entire year while the earth became cold and the birds stopped singing. When he found the dragon he fought it and freed the maiden, who returned to the skies and brought back life to the earth. But the warrior lay bleeding outside the castle. His blood streamed through the snow and from it rose snowdrop flowers. There are many other myths and traditions tied to the martisor depending on region. These days most strings also have a charm most often in the shape of a snowdrop, a key, or a four leafed clover.

Since it is a celebration of spring, vendors also sell a plethora of flowers. Hyacinths are particularly popular.

I did my best to capture some of the bustle in the market using pen, which is usually my medium of choice when sketching quickly, though I have also been leaning towards using pencil lately, especially if I want to color the illustrations afterward. Pen tends to bleed when water is applied over it.

Fashion illustration has had a natural evolution from strictly representational to more expressive and even slightly abstract styles, rather like most of art has evolved since the invention of photography, and more importantly in this case since color photography.

As photographic technology advanced and clothing became simpler (which can perhaps be attributed to the rise of the ready-to-wear approach to fashion) illustrations became more creative as the viewer does not necessarily need the image to be a perfect reference, but simply a loose representation of what the garments look like. Though illustrations on commercial patterns are still fairly precise.

From the about 60s onward, things start to change. Color photography eliminates the need to represent the clothing entirely. Fashion illustration in a publication is now no longer needed. (Though fashion designers obviously still draw fashion illustrations when creating the concept for a new garment.) However, they are still used in a more artistic capacity. The photograph provides the literal representation of a garment, while the illustration is meant to show either what the designer thinks of the garment or what it feels like to wear the garment.

Downton D, (2015). Chanel Couture. [JPEG]. Available at: Couture – David Downton

Fashion is not my forte. And I find that drawing clothes and fabric in general is something I still have to work on. I did my best to take the reportage approach to drawing fashion and I would like to think I succeeded in giving a general impression of what I was seeing at the time. The sketches below were drawn at an ice skating rink so even if people were in motion I could at least see them pass once or twice. This did not really help in capturing more details however. There is also the fact that I still find drawing people in public slightly awkward. I would like to get over this awkwardness and I hope it won’t be too difficult since I can say that I am now comfortable with drawing in public in general.

I did manage to capture motion in the figures, not well, but it is there. I also attempted to draw different types of people of different ages and sizes. Everyone was dressed in warm clothing, obviously, but there was variation in color and style (though I may have exaggerated some of the colors for the sake of variety, a lot of people wore dark clothing.)

Since detail had been lacking in the reportage-style fashion illustrations, I tried my hand at something a more similar to fashion illustrations as the ones in the research task above. I drew myself since I was the most readily available person who was willing to pose for a longer period of time. The clothes are simply the ones I was wearing that day, though in the second illustration I pulled on an overly dramatic housecoat I thought would be fun to draw. I liked doing the sleeve especially. The addition of the sketchbook in the first drawing and the pen in the second may pull these closer to self-portrait territory than fashion illustration, but I can’t say I mind. The standing poses and the lack of distinct facial features (aside from the glasses) I think evoke the aesthetic well enough. Though I could have exaggerated the proportions a little, I think the fashion figure is supposed to be around nine heads tall. Mine is six, which is realistic but perhaps not as aesthetically pleasing.

Architectural illustration comes in many different styles and can be approached with all sorts of mediums from watercolors and inks to digital painting and three dimensional programs. Medium and approach greatly depend on the architect/illustrator’s goal and personal direction. An architectural illustration for a museum exhibit or an educational manual will look different from an illustration meant to showcase a new architectural concept.

The Society of Architectural Illustrators offers a range of resources, one of which is their Drawing on Architecture book, which presents the wonderful work of their members, who are all leaders in thier field of expertise. Here are three I have selected and my thoughts on how their approaches differ:

Forthergill’s work is light and airy, most often filled with green and a sunny atmosphere. His linework is clean but unobtrusive and his colors are lively but not shocking. Watercolor and pencil is his medium of choice, which he uses to great effect in his aerial views, house portraits and other architectural illustrations. His focus is on creating natural and relaxed images which stay true to the building in question.

Hornblower’s work is much more painterly and bold, it doesn’t look as clean by comparison but is no less precise. He also seems more inclined to include people, or evidence of their existence in the world of the drawing. He uses watercolor as well, but his work is more high contrast as light seems to be more of a focus in his paintings than in other architectural work. All architectural illustrations tend to have excellent lighting in order to best describe the geometry of the buildings or rooms, but the lighting in his work seems to have a more central role.

Holmes’ illustrations are primarily digital. He works in two and three dimensional painting software, sometimes combining traditional mediums with digital ones. He creates unique atmospheric paintings that do not sacrifice precision for style. Digital painting tends to create a photographic feeling, but his work never really leans into the photorealistic direction, he allows the brushwork to live in the background while the structures boast more detail.

The subject I chose for my own architectural illustration is the Greco-Catholic church located downtown in my city. It’s official name is Buna Vestire or “The Good News”, but everyone calls it the Small Cathedral because there is a much larger Cathedral just a little farther east. The architecture is well described by its original purpose as a Greco-Catholic church and was loosely inspired by St. Peter’s Basilica. It has been in use by an Eastern Orthodox parish since 1948 when the communists arrested Iosif Pop, the archpriest, when he refused to change to the Eastern Orthodox denomination. Attempts to give it back were made in 2014, but have thus far been unsuccessful.

The building was raised from 1926-1936 with much support from mayor Emil Dandea, the first Romanian mayor of Târgu Mureș, whose statue (sculptor Anton Raţiu, 1996) stands before the church.

The theme of the exercise is contrast and the reason I chose this particular location was because there were vantage points from which I could see both the church and the (very small) mall in the background. I thought this could serve as an interesting contrast between new versus old.

I started the exercise by taking photographs and sketching on site. The sketching had to be done across a couple of days since the weather is not yet optimal for this sort of outdoor activity. I tried to learn the shapes of the building and capture contrast of shape between the curves of the church and the square shape of the mall.

As I was sketching, I realized that there were a few chinks in my plan. It was very difficult to find an angle at which both mall and church could be seen clearly. Some creative liberty had to be taken then. I went home with the sketches, thumbnails and photographs and created new new compositions based on those and with the theme in mind. The first sketch, with the church seen from farther away, actually omits the new/old theme in favor of just contrast of shape. I thought the markings on the ground were interesting in comparison with the domes of the church. The second drawing is more in theme and is a combination of one of the photographs and several of the sketches.

To further push the contrast in the last illustration, I changed the colors of the mall from warm yellows to blues. Cooler colors give more modern feeling, especially if they describe light sources. The church corner in the foreground remains warm, which both brings it forward in the composition and maintains the feeling of age.

Botanical illustration is a craft which goes back to as far as we can find examples of art or any visual representation of the natural world. It has evolved over time with the discovery of new and more precise mediums, from the illuminated texts of the medieval age, to charming woodcut prints to fine etchings and lithographs.

At first botanical illustration was the only way to share and inform others about botany in a visual way which does not involve actually carrying a plant everywhere. The advent of the printing press made this process even easier because the images could then be accompanied by the written word, and unlike illuminated manuscripts, could be printed out multiple times and shared much more widely.

The technology evolved even further with the invention of copperplate etching in the early Renaissance and other latter techniques such as aquatint and mezzotint developed around the late eighteenth century, which allow for finer shading techniques. Studies of famous artists for large scale oil paintings have been found in all manner of mediums such as silver point, pencil, ink and chalk.

Watercolor and body color (gouache) on both paper and vellum never went out of use since the medieval period and are still favorite mediums for botanical artists today.

Photography somewhat eliminated the need for botanical illustrators. But similar to fashion illustration, since the requirement for a perfect representation of the subject is no longer necessary artists are now pursuing much more creative approaches. Though precision and adherence to the character of the plant is a little more valued than accuracy in depicting a garment is in fashion illustration.

While some artists like Tanja Möderscheim seek to explore classical ways of painting plant life by using the same sorts of pigments the masters would have, Angie Lewis and Hannah McVicar push the multimedia printing aspect of botanical illustration into the future creating modern botanical illustrations with roots in the past. Others take even more unusual approaches like sculpting out of glass (Laura Hart) or paper (Kate Kato). Illustrators like Niki Simpson take advantage of the new digital mediums to create precise but beautiful renditions of nature.

Flowers are not things I draw often so, but I did my best to depict this Hyacinth first in a more precise drawing and then in a more artistic or fanciful one. Before even starting the sketch, I photographed the plant from several angles and just stopped to analyze it and its shapes and textures. The flowers look delicate but have a solid, sort of waxy body. It grows from a bulb rather than form a seed. The leaves are long and striated vertically, and instead of being flat each leaf forms a sort of cup which protects the stem (which is also very thick to support the heavy flowers). This particular plant also had some similarly waxy buds.

While observing, I also made note of these things in the sketchbook both with words and some sketches. This helped me understand the shapes of the plant better, especially when it came to the flowers. While sketching, I observed that the flowers grow in a stair stepping pattern on the stem and that each bud had six petals. The petals are in two sizes, a broader and larger size and a narrower size. They alternate around the center, where the flowers’ six golden stamens are clearly visible.

After this, I did my best to make an accurate pencil drawing of what I had observed, including only a little bit of background. The second drawing was definitely informed by the first, but I took a little more creative liberty with the environment and the colors. I wanted the image to evoke a joyful, springtime feeling and focused much on the light and the colors rather than the shape of the plant. It was painted with both watercolors and acrylics as I wanted to use both light watercolor washes and thicker application of white paint.

Representing the new and unfamiliar is always difficult. When it comes to illustrating a different culture or people, things can very easily go wrong if the subject is not treated with compassion and with sincerity. Mistakes can happen even if the person attempting to explain a culture or a people is part of said culture and people, let alone when the artist or writer is a stranger. As in the image above, if the objective is to make one people seem fundamentally superior to another, or worse create the impression that one group is less than human then the portrayal is faulty to the core.

Early European explorers were especially guilty of this, but more genuine attempts can be found in history as well.

Sydney Parkinson’s illustrations of the Gwegal people native to Australia are a good example of a more sympathetic portrayal which can be found even in early explorers. The images are colorful and pleasant, portraying both the place and the people in a light that doesn’t make them seem like terrifying savages or exotic creatures, but simply humans from another place. Despite the fact that Parkinson was on the voyage to record findings visually for scientific reasons, the images of the people do not degrade them to being subjects of study. In fact, their faces are friendly and smiling and the images look like simple portraits. And the artist also included elements of their culture which showcase their love for beauty and their ingenuity, things like the warship, the image with tools, the magnificent headdresses and woven fabrics, earrings, and tattoos.

A journal of a voyage to the South Seas: in His Majesty’s ship, the Endeavor: faithfully transcribed from the papers of the last Sydney Parkinson, draughtsman to Joseph Banks, esq on his late expedition with Dr. Solander around the world/ embellished, London: printed for Charles Dily, in the Poultry, and James Phillips, in the George-Yard, 1784, Parkinson, Sydney, 1745-1771

Captain Cook’s arrival in Australia wasn’t a happy event for the Gweagal people. The first encounter was not only antagonistic in general but also bloody on the side of the Gweagal. Rather more so than western history would admit, their oral history doesn’t exactly match the history written by Cook and his crew. Still Parkinson’s illustrations are a human portrayal of the people he encountered on Botany Bay and Port Jackson, and are a great look into the history and culture of the Gwegal at the time.

I was asked to illustrate a journey from point A to point B in a few snapshots. I took a walk from a friend’s house to my own home and illustrated five locations in pencil. I mostly focused on the buildings and tried to find interesting shapes to include in the compositions. The first drawings were simply done in pencil because I intended to paint over the illustrations at home.

The colors I chose are somewhat imaginary because the day I drew the sketches it was rather miserable and grey out. I wasn’t caught in the rain, surprisingly. I thought it would make for better drawings if I used warmer colors because they came out looking charming and a little naïve in style.

The largest church in the city (which I kept comparing the church from the architectural illustration exercise to) is in the background of the penultimate drawing, though I didn’t attempt to portray it very precisely. As a series, there isn’t much connecting the illustrations other than style and medium. But I would like to think that a determined enough person might be able to follow the same route I did by using the illustrations only. I wouldn’t advise anyone to attempt it, however.

As to the subject of the critical review, clarity is still lacking. I have an interest in late 19th and early 20th century illustration, the period when color printing was beginning to take off in the publishing world, giving illustrators unprecedented opportunities for creative expression. I love the work of Arthur Rackham, Beatrix Potter, Alphonse Mucha, Edmund Dulac, and so many others who set a set a high standard for color illustration in both books and magazines. I am interested both in the influences they drew from, perhaps from the work of the pre-Raphaelites, the work of greats such as Rembrandt and Durer and more contemporary artists like Monet and Sargeant; and I am also interested in the influence they had on fantastical art in the years to come. The work of artists like Maurice Sendak, Frank Frazetta, Sir Quentin Blake and Tony DiTerlizzi comes to mind.

There is a range of possible essay subjects such as: How did the new printing technology influence Arthur Rackham’s career? How did botanical illustration inform Beatrix Potter’s work? Did Dante Gabriel Rosetti’s work have a concrete influence on Alphonse Mucha’s style? And so on. I still have to choose a subject. I am tempted to do more research on artists like Arthur Rackham and Violet Oakley and their influences.

Link to Assignment: Assignment 2 – Sarah’s Blog (sarahgallery.com)