Inktober 2019, Day 28: Ride

Inktober 2019, Day 28, prompt word, "Ride." Ink pen and marker, 8 x 11 in. by Ciana Pullen. [Image description: black and white realistic drawing of a woman in a knit cap and scarf sitting by a dark train window. Her darker reflection is in the window. At the bottom of the page a side-view of a subway train in the dark shows three lit windows illuminating sketchily drawn passengers. The same woman pictured above with the same white cap is visible through the window. It reads a bit like comic panels showing inside and outside the train.]

Inktober 2019, Day 22: Ghost

I struggle with "less is more," especially with ink, so I was especially pleased with the light markmaking in the background of this.The marks on the shirt also look sculpted, which was a cool effect. This was, once again, the effect of poring over some old Anders Zorn drawings. I used a reference photo for the back of my own head, because believe it or not I don't see it that often.

Inktober 2019, Day 22, prompt word, "Ghost." Dip pen and ink, 8 x 11 in. by Ciana Pullen. [Image description: black and white realistic drawing of a woman walking down a banal institutional hallway, perhaps of a school or hospital. The woman is viewed from the shoulders up to mid-skull, and from behind and to the side. Her other shoulder is out of frame. On the visible shoulder sits a tiny duplicate version of her, wearing the same striped shirt and hairdo, facing backward (toward the viewer and facing out of frame). She rests her face on her hand and looks bored. In the hallway background there is a doorway, an empty metal chair, and some fluorescent lights in a drop ceiling.]

Inktober 2018, Day 24 "Chop"

Day 24 of Inktober, prompt word "Chop." I previously wrote about Inktober here. This is an edited version, but I'm posting these daily on my Instagram, @St.Rhinoceros:

Day 24 of Inktober 2018, prompt word "Chop." Dip pen and ink. by Ciana Pullen / St. Rhinocéros. [Image description: black and white drawing of the head and shoulders of a woman. She holds a knife with a sphere impaled on the end of it, which she examines with a disinterestedly skeptical expression. The sphere contains an image of a bird flying over treetops, as in a crystal ball or a parallel reality contained within the sphere. The sphere is the light source; the background is black and the figure is shaded in high contrast. Somewhat realistic style.]

Inktober 2018, Day 23 "Muddy"

Day 23 of Inktober, prompt word "Muddy." I previously wrote about Inktober here. This is an edited version, but I'm posting these daily on my Instagram, @St.Rhinoceros:

Day 23 of Inktober 2018, prompt word "Muddy." Dip pen and brush, ink. By Ciana Pullen / St. Rhinocéros. [Image description: black and white drawing the head and shoulders of a woman who is spinning around from upper left to bottom right of the image to face something the lower right of the viewer. She has wet stringy hair that is smacking her in the face and blobs of mud flying off of her face and torso. There's a big splash of mud through the negative space in the background in the upper section of the image. Most of the drawing is done with messy dark ink washes. The face is done with crosshatching pen marks. The face looks intense and angry.]

Inktober 2018 Day 21, "Drain"

Day 21 of Inktober, prompt word "Drain." I previously wrote about Inktober here. This is an edited version, but I'm posting these daily on my Instagram, @St.Rhinoceros:

Day 21 of Inktober 2018, prompt word "Drain." I shamelessly stole the pinecone head idea from a phenomenal 1920s Dada / surrealist artist named Claude Cahun; she once wore a costume pinecone or fungus on her head and took some photos. I intended to come up with a more meaningful object with which to replace the head, but after serious effort I was unable to improve on the pinecone. [Image description: black and white ink drawing showing a woman with a big pinecone for a head who has just dropped to her knees and is reaching blindly for her human face/head, which has somehow come off and is melting and dripping through an invisible grid that forms the plane of the ground. The figure is top left, the face is bottom right, and she reaches toward the viewer. She wears shorts, sneakers and a loose cropped T-shirt. Her face is conventionally pretty and calmly smiling but one eye has dripped through the grate. A swath of abstract black brushstrokes behind and to the right of the figure highlight that area of the illustration. The style is graphic-realistic, not cartoony.]

Inktober 2018 Day 20 "Breakable"

Day 20 of Inktober, prompt word "Breakable." I previously wrote about Inktober here. This is an edited version, but I'm posting these daily on my Instagram, @St.Rhinoceros:

Day 20 of Inktober 2018, prompt word "Breakable." Dip pen and ink. By Ciana Pullen / St. Rhinocéros. [Image description: black and white ink drawing of a woman walking on a beach. A more detailed rectangular section in the upper center of the page shows a woman in a sweatshirt and jeans walking near the waves viewed from far away. A piece of driftwood and seaweed sits half buried in the sand. Beyond the frame of that rectangular section is a series of five overlapping contour line drawings of a nude woman walking, looking up and looking down and ahead, walking forward and, with perspective, moving diagonally from upper left to lower right toward the viewer. The larger version of the driftwood also makes an overlapping appearance beyond the rectangular section. The horizon line and edge of the waves extends also beyond the section forming a triangular shape because of perspective. The overall style is realistic, not cartoony.]

Inktober 2018 Day 6, "Drooling"

Day 6 of Inktober, prompt word "Drooling." I previously wrote about Inktober here. This is an edited version, but I'm posting these daily on my Instagram, @St.Rhinoceros:

Day 6 of Inktober 2018, prompt word "Drooling." Dip pen and ink. [Image description: black and white realistic line drawing of a woman in a striped shirt dragging a much larger version of herself. The small woman is straining. The large woman is limp and drooling profusely; her slack face is visible in the foreground.]

Figure sketch

5 second warm-up sketch, by Ciana Pullen

Testing New Pen Nibs on a Burberry Ad

Sketch of a Burberry ad, by Ciana Pullen / St. Rhinocéros

Untitled by Ciana Pullen

Untitled, by Ciana Pullen, 2013. Acrylic on paper.

This is from a series where I identified subtle visual ways in which the media portrays people by race and gender (limited to Black and White, male and female), and then "swapped" them for the race and gender of the imaginary subject. For instance, common poses, lighting, background colors, angles, and mood.

Seated Woman, by Ciana Pullen

Seated Woman, by Ciana Pullen. Sketched from life, chalk pastel, 2010.

Woman on a Chair (Blue and Orange), by Ciana Pullen

Woman on a Chair (Blue and Orange) by Ciana Pullen. Figure drawing from life, chalk pastel, 2009.