'Tis the Season to Scribble a Favorite Toy or Two

For fun this holiday season, I thought I'd share a few sketches I did this fall during a drawing class I took.

My special assignment during this term was to "work big" again, transferring my scribbling style to larger paper.

Our first assignment was to do a "heroic drawing."  In the context of our class, that meant drawing something small much bigger than real life.

In my context, "heroic" usually means Batman.

So here is a sketch, done with pastel on 18 x 22 newsprint, of one of my favorite Batman toys.

I worked from both the item itself and from a photograph I took of the item, particularly to get the shadow and shine. 

It was terrific fun to make this little toy (maybe 3 inches in height?) so big.

It was terrifically messy to work with pastels. I love how they look, but whew!  What a mess!  Not so bad in the art studio, but at home I have to put down a drop cloth.  

This has me thinking that doing more sketches of some of my favorite things might be a delightful way to spend some scribbling time!  On one hand, it allows me to pay close, focused attention to one of the things that sits out on a shelf and rarely gets a good look.  And on the other, it allows me to consider the notion of "portrait" with something other than people or animals.  I like how my feelings about the object come through in a scribble like this.

Looking forward to more.