In the basic Renaissance Tradition, a point is a line on end, a line is the edge of a plane, and the plane is the skin on a form.
In this system there is no such thing as shapes only planes which are always part of a form unit. We first visualize the form units or mass conception, always in a volumetric sculptural mode. You construct not copy, your construction lines are once again the edge of a plane, and the plane is part of the skin of a form. These construction lines move in and out of space, they are; gestural, rhythmic, axiomatic, volumetric, intrinsic, and architectonic. We use construction lines to define a notional space or proscenium to place our objective sculptural figure. We use perspective construction to establish the ground plane or floor plan for our structure to stand on. In figure construction it is about creating an idealized representation of the human form. A proportional model to judge all others, real or imaginary by.
It has nothing to do with drawing the model and everything to do with understanding what the model is doing. To have empathy with “the doing” we have to view the pose 360. Our subconscious needs to process how all the form units relate to each other in their notional space. This is the first stage of gesture or gestalt. One must understand what the major parts are doing (how they are projecting in space) to effectively understand the whole. This is the most important part of any drawing, the stage almost no one takes the time to do, and the reason most drawings fail. We look at the pose but don’t see it, we look at the pose but don’t feel it, we start to draw something before we know anything about it. We cannot draw what we don’t know. (We can copy it, but we can’t draw it.
