I’ve taken up the half marathon drawing again. See my post from last week. It kept on nagging at me – bringing me it’s lead – come on, I need a walk!

So here we go again:

First of all I decided to get a bit more structure in, so Iput in some black linear work which has given it a kind of rhythm which I felt was good for the runners. They need to get into their stride. However, this seems to have flattened the surface of the drawing out a bit, so I decided to put in some mid range tones to give the image more body and depth. Following on from this I decided to put in some highlights to emphasise certain areas and then rework the black on top, after which I thought I’d be getting somewhere with this drawing! Hurrah!!

Humph!

Not quite as planned. I thought this was heavy-weight watercolour paper, not some namby-pamby thin cartridge paper. I don’t know my own strength and must have been too vigorous with it. There’s a hole in my drawing dear Liza, dear Liza; There’s a hole in my drawing; Dear Liza, a hole!

I think it is time to sit back and push the pause button again. Mending it with straw is not the correct solution, dear Henry, and fancy getting such an injury so early on in the race, I fear this might need help from the St John Ambulance service.

Also, is it still a drawing? Yes – but it seems to want to turn itself into a painting. It has a life of it’s own, like an ill-trained dog hauling at it’s leash. It wants to go that way, not my way! There are some intriguing elements buried under the surface rubble, some of which are beginning to poke through the charcoal, and I want to help rescue them. But how to do it, that is the question? Bloodhound, or Liza, or both?