My youngest daughter, Katy, has been taking art classes at the Cincinnati Art Academy this summer, so I have been duplicating some of her interesting exercises while she’s in bed or not watching.
Last week, her instructor made them engage in some 45-second sketching exercises. Katy and the other students were shown an object and given 45 seconds to sketch it. I was fascinated by how the students could capture the essence of the object in such a short period.
It reminded me of some Zen ink painting I had done in college, but that’s another story.
So I resolved to sketch some of my furniture designs in 45 seconds or less to see what would happen. I have about 20 different forms floating around in my head right now, so I barfed out a few this evening while sitting in a Syracuse, N.Y., hotel room.
After a few crappy attempts I got into a groove. First I drew the floor – that was a huge help. Then I started sketching the elevation.
I tried sketching some orthographic views, but those were more difficult because I fussed over getting the perspective correct instead of capturing the overall form. My best drawings were simple straight-on views of elevation, profile and plan.
And 45 seconds is plenty of time.
I drew these on the back of some old airline boarding passes. I forgot my sketch book.
— Christopher Schwarz
