Drawing Course Pl.30
1867
Step one to becoming a master artist: draw a lot of legs. This plate comes from the 'Cours de Dessin' by Charles Bargue, a grueling drawing course published in the 1860s that taught students to see form through geometry. The left side shows the 'skeleton' of the drawing with construction lines, while the right reveals the fully shaded, realistic plaster cast. Famous students like Van Gogh and Picasso used these exact prints to train their eyes before they were allowed to draw from life. It represents the peak of academic art training, where copying plaster casts was the only way to learn.
Views: 1