Silverpoint

The Palace Doorway, Venice

The Palace Doorway, plate 22 from the North Italian Set, D. Y. Cameron, 1895
Art Institute of Chicago

D. Y. Cameron, The Palace Doorway, plate 22 from the North Italian Set, 1895. Etching on ivory laid paper.

Pins mark where to look before you draw.

The Art Institute of Chicago · Bryan Lathrop Collection

Master studyLine + Mass

The Palace Doorway, Venice

A facade as two masses of dark and one plane of light

From the North Italian Set of 1896: a Venetian water-door seen square on, the two arched openings black, the carved facade above them a single lit plane, the canal a band of broken horizontals. Cameron shows how a building becomes a design: three values, placed before any ornament.

In pencilAn etched line is a drawn line. Copy it with hard grades and long points: tone from the spacing and direction of lines, cross-hatching only in the darkest third, no smudging anywhere.

Difficulty
Time
about 2.5 h
You draw with
H, HB, 2B, 4B graphite
Grouping valuesThe window as a voidTone from lineThe round archWater as a mirror

Why this one

  • The clearest value design on a facade in the catalogue: dark, light, dark again.
  • The ornament is real and exact, but it never breaks the big shape.
  • Water drawn as a few horizontal breaks, not a reflection of everything above it.

From your kit

The whole kit →
  1. 1Grafwood H, HB, 2B, 4B H, HB for layout and line; 2B, 4B for the darks. Long points from the Blackwing on everything up to B.
  2. 2Kneaded eraser and the Mono Zero press-and-lift corrections only; the Mono Zero for a single sharp light.
  3. 3Alpha sketchbook 9 x 6 draw at the book's size and keep the proportions; date the page.
In general, this study asks for
  • Drawing pad or smooth cartridge
  • 2H and H with long points
  • HB for accents
  • Kneaded eraser
  • Sandpaper block

Watch first

All videos →

Two- and three-value notan, the exact exercise the Mass studies start with.

YouTube
Printmaking process: intaglioMinneapolis Institute of Art · Four minutes that make every etching in this catalogue legible: ground, needle, acid, ink, wipe, press.Cross-hatching drawing techniques: pen, ink, pencilArt Prof · Cross-hatching taught as a value system, which is how the etchers used it.

The plan

4 stages · ~95 min
  1. 1

    Three values first

    15 min

    Squint. On a scrap, a two-inch notan: paper, one grey, one black. The doors are black, the facade grey-light, the water grey. Nothing else exists yet.

    The same landscape reduced to two values, three values and four values, showing that the design is readable at two and complete at four2 VALUESThe design. If thisfails, nothing saves it.3 VALUESCorot's working number.4 VALUESFinished. More steps addpolish, not strength.Notan: the arrangement of light and dark, Japanese for "light-dark".Squint until the scene collapses to three flat shapes. Draw those first.Every lesson in the Mass unit starts here.A drawing with a good two-value design and bad details beats one with perfect details and no design.
    FigureTwo values, then three.
    Checklist0 / 1
  2. 2

    The elevation

    25 min

    H, long point: the facade is an elevation, square to you. Plumb verticals, the two arches as true half-circles on their springing line, the cornice as one horizontal. Measure the arches against the facade's width before committing.

    A semicircular Romanesque arch with its centre on the springing line, radiating voussoirs and a keystone, over an impost and a pierROUND ARCH · CENTRE ON THE SPRINGING LINEcentrekeystonevoussoirs radiate fromthe centreimpostEvery joint in the arch points at the centre. Draw three joints that do, and the eye believes the rest.
    FigureThe round arch sits on its springing line.
    Checklist0 / 3
  3. 3

    Tone by direction

    45 min

    HB and 2B: the lit facade as widely spaced vertical lines, the ornament drawn into it with the point. The doors as close cross-hatch down to black, 4B last. The water as short horizontals, their spacing opening toward the edges.

    The etcher's value scale: five steps from white paper to near-black made only with line, first parallel hatch, then a second layer crossing, then a third, then a fourthVALUE FROM LINE ONLY · HOW AN ETCHING THINKSpaperlight1 layerlight halftone2 layershalftone3 layersshadow4 layersdarkEach layer crosses the last at a new angle. Keep spacing even within a layer. Letthe line weight stay constant.Meryon, Cotman, Forrest: every shadow is counted in layers. This is the discipline the Line unit builds.
    FigureSpacing is the value.
    Checklist0 / 3
  4. 4

    Compare

    10 min

    Side by side. Did the ornament break the lit plane? Did the water go darker than the doors? Note it. Date it. Box it.

    Checklist0 / 2

What it should look like

  • A facade that reads as three values from across the room.
  • Two black doors that are the darkest things on the sheet.
  • Ornament you can see up close and cannot see from the door.

Where it goes wrong

  • The ornament takes over. Carving is seductive and the hand wants detail. Draw the ornament as texture inside one value, with the hatching's spacing unchanged.
  • Vertical reflections under the doors. You know water reflects. Look: Cameron drew broken horizontals. Copy what is there.

Log this session

Start the clock when you pick up the pencil. Stop it when you put it down. Log it. Every session counts toward the box.

00:00of ~150 min

Status

How did it go?

Up nextJohn Knox's House

Before this, ideally

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