Drawing & Figure Studies

Observational Work for Fine Arts Study

I draw to understand. These pieces are not illustrations of an idea after the fact, but part of the thinking itself: still lifes, figures, rooms, and landscapes drawn from life, with as much honesty as I can manage about what I see and what I still do not yet understand.

This site gathers the drawings and related studies I would send with a fine arts application. It centres drawing and observational practice, with a small amount of photography and costume work to show range rather than distraction.

🎨 Drawing Portfolio

This section follows the drawing categories most frequently requested in fine arts applications: still life from observation, figure and anatomy, portrait, space and perspective, landscape, narrative work, and sketchbook pages that record study and revision.

✏️ Observational Still Life

Still life is where I practise value, edges, and composition. These pieces are drawn directly from life: glass, metal, folded cloth, books, small bones, and instruments arranged under a single light source.

🧍‍♀️ Figure & Anatomy Studies

These drawings are exercises in structure. I treat the body as three main masses—head, ribcage, pelvis—with limbs attached as volumes rather than lines. Much of this work is drawn from life, or from reference studied as if from a model rather than copied mechanically.

• Proportion of limbs to torso in standing and seated poses.
• Foreshortening of arms and legs moving towards the viewer.
• Indication of major skeletal landmarks without overstatement.

🪞 Portrait & Self-Portrait

Portrait work is where I slow down. I am interested in subtle proportion, steady light, and the way likeness rests on the structure of the skull rather than on stylisation.

🏛️ Rooms, Space & Perspective

These drawings explore how rooms hold the body. Desks, chairs, staircases, and corridors are treated as structures that guide and frame movement. The aim is a convincing sense of space without unnecessary ornament.

🌳 Landscape & Environment

These pieces are drawn on site: streets, small parks, and corners of the city. The focus is on large shapes, simple value, and the rhythm of buildings, trees, and paths in space.

🧠 Narrative & Concept Drawing

Here I bring together technical drawing and idea. Hospital corridors, classrooms, and more dreamlike interiors hold figures whose anatomy and perspective are grounded in study, even when the scenes themselves are symbolic.

📓 Sketchbook & Process

My sketchbooks contain gestures, corrections, small anatomical diagrams, and written notes to myself. I keep misjudged proportions and false starts in place, rather than hiding them, so that I can see what must change next.

🩻 Anatomy, Physiology & Technical Training

Drawing from anatomy and physiology is, for me, a way of studying how a living body truly stands, bends, and bears weight. I think of this section as my technical training ground: the place where I keep track of what I do not yet know as carefully as what I already understand.

Areas I am deliberately strengthening

• Technical perspective: placing the figure convincingly in space.
• Complex foreshortening of limbs and the torso.
• Clear indication of ribcage, pelvis, and major joints without over-drawing the surface.
• Translating knowledge from anatomy texts and medical diagrams into simple, readable forms on the page.

Things that come more naturally

• Thinking in simple shapes: spheres, boxes, and cylinders.
• Feeling the line of action and the overall gesture quickly.
• Keeping perspective of the whole figure in mind while refining smaller parts.
• A stubborn willingness to redraw a figure several times until it stands properly.

📐 Technical & Mechanical Drawing

Technical drawing allows me to work with objects that are not soft or forgiving: tools, machines, architectural fragments, and devices. I am interested in how precise structure, measurement, and perspective can still carry a sense of weight and presence.

👗 Costume & Character

Costume work allows me to think about clothing as structure around the body. I am interested in how fabric, armour, and small accessories cling, hang, and pull, and in how a change of costume alters the way a figure carries itself.

These drawings and studies are not commercial fashion illustration. They are character and costume designs treated with the same observational care as my figure drawing.

📷 Photography (Additional Media)

Drawing is my primary focus. These photographs are included not as a separate discipline, but as another way of thinking about light, framing, and atmosphere. Many of the subjects reappear later as drawings, sometimes altered, sometimes simply translated into graphite.

✉️ Contact & Critique

Thoughtful critique from artists, teachers, and practitioners is welcome. If you wish to respond to this work or discuss study and training, you may write to:

austinka5524@gmail.com

Please include a brief note about who you are and how you came across this portfolio.