Journal of Threatened Taxa |
www.threatenedtaxa.org | 26 September 2021 | 13(11): 19671–19674
ISSN 0974-7907 (Online) | ISSN 0974-7893
(Print)
https://doi.org/10.11609/jott.7455.13.11.19671-19674
#7455 | Received 20 May 2021 | Finally
accepted 15 September 2021
Wildlife art and illustration –
combining black and white ink drawings with colour:
some experiments in Auroville, India
M. Eric Ramanujam
1 & Joss Brooks 2
1,2 Pitchandikulam Forest Consultants, Auroville, Tamil Nadu 605101, India.
1 ericramanujamowl@gmail.com
(corresponding author), 2 joss@auroville.org.in
Editor: Anonymity requested. Date of publication: 26 September 2021 (online & print)
Citation: Ramanujam, M.E. & J.
Brooks (2021).
Wildlife art and illustration – combining black and white ink drawings with colour: some experiments in Auroville,
India. Journal of
Threatened Taxa
13(11): 19671–19674. https://doi.org/10.11609/jott.7455.13.11.19671-19674
Copyright: © Ramanujam & Brooks 2021. Creative Commons Attribution 4.0
International License. JoTT allows unrestricted use, reproduction, and
distribution of this article in any medium by providing adequate credit to the
author(s) and the source of publication.
Funding: None.
Competing interests: The authors declare no competing interests.
Representing experiences
concerning nature, with the variety of material and concepts at our disposal
during present times, is a personal, and in our case, collective interpretation
(Ramanujam & Brooks 2011). Huffington (1988),
author of Pablo Picasso’s biography mentions that he said, “nature has to exist
so that we may rape it” But we are not here to judge anybody, and
everyone is entitled to his / her own opinion, though one may vehemenantly disagree, mildly disagree or agree. In our
opinion we are simply here to find new ways of expression, experiment and
probably come up with something original and worthwhile, not to merely hold on
to some ideology / media that has worked in the past. The ‘eternal adventure’
and thrill that comes from exploring new boundaries has most of us in its
thrall and pushing beyond boundaries can often bring in a breath of fresh air
that is a ‘feeling’ one cannot put into proper prose.
Here we deal with complete
opposites: viz. a purist black and white medium (Ramanujam
& Joss 2014) versus colour where we have made
some headway in combining both media to express a fulfilling mode of
expression.
There have been some artists who
have used the technique of combining black and white pen and ink with paints
which allows achieving a high level of control and detail in conjunction with
aesthetic colour washes. One such artist has been
Angus Fraser who works primarily with natural subjects and enjoys representing
subjects in delicate but dynamic compositions. But unfortunately, not having a
taxonomical background, his compositions tend to be stilted, especially his
wildlife imagery. One such example can be seen in his rendering of a
Wedge-tailed Eagle on its nest where he shows the step by step development of
the final product <instructables-com/Ink-Pen-Watercolour-Drawing>
Our experiments centre on scientific precision which combine pen and colour, especially watercolour
pencils, though we have worked with both transparent and opaque washes at
times. This work can be seen on the covers of Journal of Threatened Taxa
for the year 2015. Our basic style of combining black ink with colour is that the colour is
minimal, hence you may generally not see the entire animal in colour (though there have been exceptions), but only what
we felt were the highlights – we allow the line work to speak for itself and
allow black and white to emerge as the principal factor.
Our style of illustration
concerning colour has often been said to be
minimalistic, which it is. Minimalism is a comparatively recent art form. It
began with the ‘De stijal art movement’ (also called
Neoplasticism) which was in fashion in between 1917 to 1930. It pushed simple
(and often abstract ideas) using lines, black and white, and simple colours to create new effects which were very popular at
the time. Though its popularity died out in just 13 years, it influenced many
artists, architects, designers, etc and the effects
are in vogue to this day. Today, wherever one turns another designer is
releasing a project featuring a minimalistic design style
<designshack.net/articles/layouts/minimalist-design-is-taking-over-heres-why/>
Minimalistic design can be identified by its simple nature and use of only what
the artist / illustrator feels is sufficient to communicate elements he / she
feels are essential. What we see with minimalism is a distinct focus on one bit
of content without competition from other elements. That is where our style
differs. Our works essentially concentrate primarily on detailed taxonomic line
work and colour is the only minimalistic element in
our otherwise detailed drawings.
We are not at all insinuating
that we are the first to come up with a new wildlife art form – Eric C. Watson
comes to mind immediately and many of his renderings too use minimalistic colour <ericwatson.com>. There are quite a few more,
but not many, as most monotone artists look upon black and white art as a
purist art form stressing clarity of line which is not to be distracted by colour or any other media. In fact it was John Gould
(1804–1881) who brought black and white together with colour.
He brought bird illustration to fine bibliographical art using
lithography, which enabled the artist to draw directly into stone giving a
softer, more flexible line. The black and white prints would then be hand-coloured by teams of skilled colourists.
He assembled a team of artists, including Edward Lear (1812–1888) and Joseph
Wolf (1820–1899)
<mallgalleries.org.uk/learning/resources/history-wildlife-art>
To the purist, combining black
and white with colour may be considered to be ‘rape’
and the pontifical reality of puritanism does exist. The principal author too
was a follower of that school until he discovered the joys of combining his
forte with colour (the secondary author had a tough
time trying to convince him for about a decade and a half to try his hand at
combining colour with black and white). Combining black and white with colour may be heresy to the purist and be condemned, but we
have enjoyed combining the two to give a ‘different’ effect.
Successful wildlife artists do
use art to depict nature, and so do textile designers, interior designers,
photographers, etc. But can this be constituted to be ‘rape’ will be the
eternal question. If one takes inspiration from nature does it mean we are
raping it? In our opinion, nature has a way of influencing the human body, mind
and, if something like it exists, the soul. Their success is their selling
value but many give it back – for example, David Shepherd
<davidshepherd.org> and Robert Bateman <batemanfoundation.org/gallery-education>
How many amateur artists paint
for the simple joy of just creating something inspired by nature with no
thought of financial profit? Here lies the crux, and if Pablo Picasso was
consumed by the salability value of his pieces when he said what he said, it is
his prerogative – suffice is to say his personal conclusion does not impress
us.
References
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(2014). Taxonomic
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Journal of Threatened Taxa 6(1): 5305–5314. https://doi.org/10.11609/JoTT.o3636.5305-14
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A.F. (1988). Pablo
Picasso: Creator and Destroyer. Avon Books, 558pp.
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some experiments in Auroville, India. Journal of
Threatened Taxa 3(4): 1702–1710. https://doi.org/10.11609/JoTT.o2673.1702-10
Ramanujam, M.E. & J. Brooks (2014). Wildlife art and illustration:
Drawing in ink - some experiments in Auroville India.
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