Trees on a Mountainside
Corot, Trees on a Mountainside, 1856. Cliché-verre on ivory photographic paper.
The Art Institute of Chicago · Gift of the Print and Drawing Club
Trees on a Mountainside
Corot, 1856: a plate copy from a scratched line
Trees on a Mountainside, 1856: Cliché-verre on ivory photographic paper, Image: 18.5 × 15.4 cm (7 5/16 × 6 1/8 in.); Sheet: 19.9 × 16.4 cm (7 7/8 × 6 1/2 in.) (The Art Institute of Chicago). A plate copy: the standard protocol for a scratched line applied to this one sheet at the size of your book, with Corot's own habits as the checklist. Squint first. Count the masses. If you count more than four, squint harder.
In pencilA cliche-verre is drawn by scratching through an opaque coating on glass, then printed like a photograph: every scratched line prints dark, and the untouched coating prints white. The drawing is all line, with no tone except what line density gives. Copy it on scratchboard, or lay a flat 4B field and draw with the eraser as if it were the stylus.
- Difficulty
- Time
- about 1.5 h
- You draw with
- scratchboard and stylus, or 4B tone and a precision eraser
Why this one
- The three divisions of light. Decide them before the first mark, and never let the distance borrow a dark from the foreground.
- Trees as masses that catch light, with branches that zig-zag upward and vanish into the clumps. Not one branch ends in open air.
- The young Corot's contour: a hard, sharp pencil, almost no shading, every edge placed exactly, acres of untouched paper.
From your kit
The whole kit →- 1Grafwood 4B laid flat, then the Mono Zero lay an even tone with the side, then draw the lights out with the eraser as if it were the stylus.
- 2Kneaded eraser (warm it) and the clean Mono Zero press-and-lift corrections only; the Mono Zero for a single sharp light.
- 3Alpha sketchbook 9 x 6 draw at the book's size and keep the proportions; date the page.
In general, this study asks for
- A scratchboard and stylus, or
- 4B graphite laid as a flat tone plus a precision eraser
Watch first
All videos →Curators handle Corot's actual glass plates and prints. French; the images carry it even without captions.
YouTube
The plan
5 stages · ~80 min- 1
Read the plate first
5 minBefore any mark, look at Trees on a Mountainside for five minutes with the pencil down. Find the eye level or the horizon. Find the lightest light and the darkest dark and notice whether they touch. Count the big shapes: it is rarely more than four. Say what the picture is about in one sentence.
Checklist0 / 3 - 2
Envelope and masses
10 minMeasure the sheet's proportion and draw the envelope lightly at the size you will work. Place the horizon as a fraction of the height. Block the three or four big shapes as pale outlines, checking each against the others with the pencil held at arm's length. No detail yet; if a line is inside a shape, it is too early.
TipBeginners rush this stage. Masters spend half the drawing here.
Checklist0 / 3 - 3
Lay the field
15 minIf working in graphite: cover the drawing area with an even 4B field at a middle-dark value, side of the lead, slip sheet under the hand. This is your coated glass.
Checklist0 / 2 - 4
Draw the light out
40 minNow every mark takes tone away. With the precision eraser (or stylus), draw the lines the plate shows as light, and leave dark where it is dark. Density of scratched lines makes the lights; untouched field makes the darks. Work from the largest light to the smallest.
Checklist0 / 3 - 5
Compare and note
10 minSide by side with the original: where did you add what was not there? Where did you darken what was light? Write one sentence on the sheet about what to change next time. Date it. Box it.
Checklist0 / 2
What it should look like
- A drawing that reads as light lines on dark.
- No shading: only the density of scratched line.
Where it goes wrong
- Thinking in positive line. Every habit says draw the dark. Say 'I am drawing the light' before each stroke.
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.
Status
How did it go?
