Kelly Leigh

8 thoughts on “Kelly Leigh”

• This is an amazing study! And to acheive that gritty,tense and fleshy final piece with coloured pencils is astounding!!! I have studied and admired Jenny Savilles work for a while and it has that same,real feel that her work does.

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• I hadn’t realised how important ‘dynamism’ is to me! I hope that I made clear that it’s often better to work out some of the problems in the final piece. This makes the preparatory work more like ‘rehearsals’ or warm-ups for the performance that it the climactic drawing. There ought to be something at stake, at risk, in assignment pieces and not just a polished version of the best preparatory piece.
  This risk can add tension – and, yes, dynamism – which makes the final piece a journey of discovery and not just one of display.
  It’s also worth noting how small changes can make a big difference to a piece. When I selected this piece to talk about, part of my reasoning was that Kelly was aware of the shortcomings of the middle piece and had documented her decision making process in the Learning Log. The final piece, I was confident, was not an accident and that she had worked at making decisions that benefited her final submission. Writing about failure and how one might find a way through it is really important.

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• Wonderful Kelly so happy for you. Puts me in mind of Jenny Saville work but with your own spin and individuality. Well done.

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• May I crit? The hands themselves really want to be better understood structurally. There are no bones and knuckles in them. This would add to the feeling of tension – strong firm hands contrasting with soft yielding flesh.

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  • I agree with your comments. I do welcome any positive criticisms and use them to improve my work. As you can probably tell hands are not one of my strengths. Thank you for everyone’s comments, it was a privilege to have my work chosen and it is nice to know that all my hard work has been noticed.

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• I liked the fleshiness and the sense of gripping torture in the prep sketch and the final piece. Great! I has something of Rubens, Bacon, Freud and Saville about it – but I agree with Sally (above) that the hands ought to have shown that contrast between soft fatty flesh and gripping, tensioned hands. (I know – hands are not at all easy to tackle).

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• Great work!

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• Your final reflects the gestural intensity of your initial drawing. I agree with the comment ‘let the final piece dictate where it goes’ by doing so an element of rawness is retained which makes the work more truthful.

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