Today's drawing is a continuation of yesterdays theme of looking at human and horse. Both the human figure and the horse are important subjects which run through my personal practice. They are used to bring together my passion for history and horses through the use of mixed media. 

I found an old reference photo in my collection of a young woman in a flowing dress on her horse and decided to use it for today's drawing. Although this piece isn't inspired by history, I wanted to use the image just as a starting point to put into practice what I'd learnt yesterday on how the proportions of the human figure compares to that of the horse. I also wanted to continue where I left off before this project started by exploring how to combine my love of both abstract and figurative art to create honest and meaningful yet interesting and original art. 

The media I used for this one was fine liner pen, charcoal, pastel, ballpoint pen, Posca pen and acrylic paint. I also used various scraping and scratching methods such at sandpaper and sticks to etch into the surface to achieve a variety of textures. I began by using the continuous line drawing method to draw the horse and rider. I find that this loosens up my drawing and I don't get bogged down with details before I even begin. The form then starts to develop when more media is applied.

As the drawing evolved I recognised that I was beginning to make intuitive marks such as the long, vertical shapes in the foreground and wanted to experiment further with the materials I had to hand. If something didn't quite work, I'd find the courage to paint, draw or even scrape over it to begin that part again. One important thing that the last few months has taught me is that it's absolutely ok to make mistakes and to cover them up and start again. It only adds to the history of the work itself. Mistakes are positive and by making them we learn so much.  

The drawing went through MANY stages before getting to this point. In fact there was one place that it got to where I truly wanted to walk away and come back to it the next day with fresh eyes but because I'm on a time limit with these 100 day pieces, I had to continue on. Because of this I feel I ran out of fuel and made some right royal cock ups. One of these was the light source. It's way out of kilter. The woman's face is lit up yet the horse isn't. If the light is coming from the right then the horse would be lit up too. I had reworked the horse's head so many times that when I tried to apply the white acrylic it appeared 'muddy'. The lack of contrast between the horse's head and the background takes away any depth that should be there, making the drawing appear flat and uninteresting. If I'd had more time I'm certain I could've rectified this problem.  

At a glance, to me, the drawing looks unfinished but I had fun creating it and enjoyed exploring the media. This is the kind of process I'll be continuing with after the project is over albeit a little less rushed and a lot more considered.