Faun
my rendition of a Picasso drawing
Faun, watercolor pencil on paper 8”x5”
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Last year, I visited the Picasso museum in the town of Antibes, France. Throughout his career, Picasso often drew on the mythical figures — nymphs, satyrs, centaurs, and fauns.
One particular piece in the museum I found fascinating — a charcoal and graphite drawing depicting a head of a faun. I liked how Picasso chose to emphasize the “construction lines” of his drawing — the initial black circles and crescents that formed the structure of the painting. In my limited art experience, I’d always strived to erase them.
I connect with the symbolism of the faun — the human connection to the wildness of nature. Picasso chose to depict the subject face-forward — more human than goat. To me, he means that the connection to nature exists in us. It is a force we should not resist.
So this is my watercolor pencil rendering of that work. Although the color palette is severely subdued — sepia, black, and grey — I wanted to explore Picasso’s structure, while attempting to produce a muted-palette watercolor.
