I began this research point by skimming through my drawing book by Gottfried Bammes, “Zeichenschule” (Complete guide to Life Drawing). Gottfried Bammes was a drawing professer at the Dresden National Fine Art Academy. His books have become classics in German academic art education.
The book is not exactly an anatomy book, but it presents a structured approach to drawing the human figure, taking anatomy into account. Divided into chapters on the different aspects, eg torso, muscles, head and face. The author seems to follow a highly instructive approach which merits devoting some study time.
There’s another book by Bammes, “An artist’s guide to human anatomy” which might be a proper anatomy book, but I don’t own that one.
A Google image search for human anatomy in art brought up a lot of hits, but I can’t stand looking at these illustrations of muscles and bones. I think the approach is not for me. I’m not into dissecting the human body (or animal body). I had the same feeling of disgust in the research point on drawing animals which asked to look at anatomy of a chosen animal species. I think I will content myself with study of what is available to direct vision and not attempt to draw the details of internal structures.
Initially I was puzzled by the task to “make an anatomical drawing” because a definition of anatomical drawing was not provided. I might draw one of my feet, trying to get the mechanics of toes and the shape of bones and muscles correctly from what I can observe.
Studying anatomy might help to convey a sense of energy, if muscle tension is depicted correctly based on knowledge of the location and behaviour of muscles in action. On the other hand, anatomical correctness will not give soul to an otherwise lifeless drawing. Anatomy is something not to overemphasize, I think.
My anatomical (?) drawings
I thought it might be interesting to do a before and after comparison – before studying the chapter on the anatomy of the foot in Bammes’ book, and afterwards. I made a sequence of drawings in my A4 sketchbook.
The first drawing was done with black pen. It is a simple line drawing without tonality. I think it captures the form of the foot quite nicely. The perspective is not entirely correct and I think the last toe should have been drawn a little larger.
The next drawings were made after studying the chapter in the drawing book. Foot 2 was made with a bold 2B graphite stick. I included a bit of the tonality. I had tried to arrange directional light, but it seemed to have been too weak as I wasn’t really able to detect strong contrasts. And the graphite pen had a bold line which didn’t really correspond to what I wanted to do.
For Foot 3 I switched to 2B pencil. The shape looks ok. There’s one huge step forward in this drawing because I managed to make really dark marks for the shadows below the toes, which gives a nice depth to the foot. I think the remainder of the drawing is a bit too light, but the shading on the leg seems roughly correct.
Then I made a brief sketch of my cat Gina. She was lying on my drawing desk next to the Bammes’ book, watching me drawing.
And the final drawing of this session, Foot 4, was done without the mirror. Instead, I sat on the floor and looked directly on the foot. Somehow this seems to make a big difference. It felt less unnatural to draw directly, compared with drawing from a mirror. The form of the foot looks ok, the shading again too light.
To summarize, I think my foot drawings are ok, although I don’t think they are anatomical drawings in a proper sense. Studying the Bammes chapter on anatomy of the foot may have had an impact but it did not cause a huge shift in drawing quality. My drawings depict part of the human anatomy, but they are not technically constructed using knowledge of the bone structure and muscle locations. Nor do I think that human anatomy could be learnt through a research point of one or two hours. Rather, the study of human anatomy merits easily 6 months of intense work and exploration. I’m afraid that I won’t be able to do this within the confines of this course. So I’ll remain on the surface and take home that if I want to do technically correct drawings of the human figure, these might benefit from taking a look at the human anatomy.
References
Gottfried Bammes: Zeichenschule. Studien zur Gestalt von Mensch und Tier, Boesner 2009
English version: Complete Guide to Life Drawing, by Gottfried Bammes, Search Press 2011. Available at Amazon, eg from http://www.amazon.com/Complete-Guide-Drawing-Gottfried-Bammes/dp/1844486907/ref=la_B001HCX7AA_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1380925782&sr=1-1 where there’s a video flipping through the book.