Noticing that prolonged standing at an easel and painting with the right hand results in a twisted torso, it seemed a good idea to spend time to learn sketching with the left hand to twist the torso in the opposite direction and thereby, hopefully, realign centrally.
Remembering that da Vinci is reported to have been ambidextrous, I looked him up on Wikipedia and noticed with disappointment that his Vitruvian Man shows two opposite twists. The belly button is displaced with respect to the sternum in one direction and the sternum and his nose are displaced in the opposite direction.
Thus, rather than trying to get help from da Vinci, I am now rereading Eric Franklin’s book ‘Dynamic Alignment through Imagery’.
Do you obsessively maintain a posture while doing your art? If yes, does it do weird things to your body alignment?
Birgit:
This may be a little beside the point of your question, but, yes, working with a band, scroll or table saw requires any number of functional postures. In using the table saw I tend to take offset positions: standing with my weight on my back foot, my arms not able to reach the blade. I then employ sticks to align and push the work into the blade. Running a long piece through the saw might require, first, using a stick in my left hand to push the edge of the piece diagonally so as to keep it against the fence while reaching back with my right to grasp the trailing edge. This procedure changes as the trailing edge approaches the blade, at which time I must place a stick so as to push the trailing edge straight through. Usually I will push through the plane of the blade, allowing it to chew the end of the stick somewhat. The key moment of attention to stance and where one is pushing occurs at the transition of hand to stick. One must maintain a continuity of action lest the piece become skewed and an unintended notch be cut in the piece. The bigger the piece the harder this is to do.
The scroll and band saw each has it’s own characteristics that one must master. A lot of the cutoff material down at House of Plastics will have defects arising from oops moments on a saw.
Jay,
Do these functional postures allow you to use your skeleton/muscles symmetrically? If not, it would be good to compensate with other ‘mindful’ movements.
I envy you for your workshop.
Birgit:
A spare thousand will put you in the workshop business.
Actually, the table saw requires highly asymmetrical postures. But the lap swim that I just returned from is rather symmetrical in a linear way.
Hmmm, and I feel like lap swimming is absolutely assymetrical for me (or was when I did it). But that’s because I could only breathe on one side. I was told to learn to breathe alternatively but thought I’d drown before I learned and therefore decided the better part of wisdom was to ignore what I was told.
Your description of the saw makes me shudder a bit. On the other hand, my neighbor needed to shave off 1/32 inch from the work he was doing for me and he managed it without saying anything nasty (in my hearing, at any rate). So, in the right hands, and with the right asymetries, miracles can occur. I guess. Just don’t get me near a saw in this life. In the next, maybe.
June:
Geometrically, symmetry is straightforward. In my case it’s highly subjective. I do breathe out of one side, but the rest of me assumes something of a straight line – or so I assume.
Go down to the store and get near one – It’ll be liberating.
I happened on this blog and found the subject up my alley. I conjunction with studying Eric Franklin’s approach I would suggest you google Posture Release Imagery. It is my imagery system and their is alot of perspective and imagery for free to be considered there. Lateral alignment is one, often noticeable aspect of posture to be considered, but there are several more.
Cheers
Thank you, John, I am studying the information on your website.
Birgit,
Thanks for looking in at my website… despite the grammatical and spelling errors in my comment above !
As a teacher of the Alexander Technique, I would definitely say that asymmetry, as noticeable as it may be, is secondary, though related, to the habitual shortening (and perhaps narrowing or over-widening) of our stature. Asymmetrical tasks, of which there are many, can be done without damage to the body.
Deliberate distortion to emphasize expression and drama is something that I often employ free hand, ie elongated necks, hands, torsos, with different angles… I love it! Mannerism is my favorite style that emerged from the later years of the Italian High Renaissance around 1520.
To be successful employed one must master the realistic dimensions, and then work by exaggerating elegance with exquisite elongated human proportions! Result, absolutely stunning!