LESSON XXIII
THE BACK FIGURE
If the student has been successful with the front figure and remembers its proportions and how to start the drawing, he will be somewhat at home when studying this lesson. As in Lesson XVII, the figure is not nude but ready for a garment, as are also the figures in Lesson XXIV and Lesson XXV.
Draw Fig. 1 and place Fig. 2 on it. This is a three-quarter back view, the figure measuring seven and three-quarter heads high.
In the back figure, the legs join the body below the middle and the waist-line curves up, not down. The head is a three-quarter back view, although a profile or seven-eighths front head may be placed on this body. Do not turn the head too far around to the front. Try turning your own head toward your back, and do not make the mistake of putting an almost full face on a back figure.
Note the hair lines, which are brushed up to the top of the head. The ends of these fines in the back form a curved up line like the back collar line.
In this view of the head, the ear is nearer the front, and the line for the neck breaks into the face, as it is on this side of it.
The trapezius muscle breaks into the neck, showing that the face and throat are forward, the throat being lost somewhat.
The far shoulder is longer and is more sloping than the near one.
The center line of the body takes two reverse curves; beginning at the neck it curves in, then out for the shoulders, in again for the waist, out again over the hips and buttock, in again to where the legs join the body.
Study the little sketch of the nude back and of the trapezius muscle as it fits on the back of the head.
Do not curve the center line too much for the fashion figure. See how the bust goes around to the front as also do the arms.