Constructive Anatomy

by George B. Bridgman

George Brant Bridgman (1865-1943) was a Canadian-American painter, writer, and teacher in the fields of anatomy and figure drawing. Bridgman taught anatomy for artists at the Art Students League of New York for some 45 years.

Constructive Anatomy: Illustrated by George B. Bridgman. Excellent book of anatomical drawing instruction. Ideal for beginning to intermediate artists, begins with instruction on drawing hands and works its way through the human body giving detailed instruction on how to draw realistic human figures.

The drawings that are presented here show the conceptions that have proved simplest and most effective in constructing the human figure.

The eye in drawing must follow a line or a plane or a mass. In the process of drawing, this may become a moving line, or a moving plane, or a moving mass.

The line, in actual construction, must come first; but as mental construction must precede physical, so the concept of mass must come first, that of plane second, that of line last.

Masses of about the same size or proportion are conceived not as masses, but as one mass; those of different proportions, in respect to their movement, are conceived as wedging into each other, or as morticed or interlocking.

Genres: Art, Drawing, Nonfiction, Reference, Art Design, Academic, Research

177 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 1920

About the author

George Brant Bridgman was a Canadian-American artist, teacher and writer. Born in Canada he spent most of his working life in the USA teaching anatomy and figure drawing at the Arts Students League of New York. His students included many future famous artists including Will Eisner, Marion Greenwood, Andrew Loomis and Norman Rockwell.

Reviews

[Parka · Rating 4 out of 5]

(More pictures at parkablogs.com)

Constructive Anatomy is like the volume two to Bridgman's Life Drawing. While the other book deals more with conceptualizing mass and form, this book takes a closer look at the parts of the body.

The commentary talks about the anatomy, mass and movement. He introduces simplified guides to drawing like using cubes to block in the mass first before going into more detail, The muscle drawings although still sketchy are delineated clear enough to show how they affect surface form. Even more detailed discussions on the muscles are dealt with in The Human Machine.

Again, just like other books, the artist with prior knowledge of anatomy will benefit more. It's recommended for intermediate artists and above.

[Yurious George · Rating 2 out of 5]

Disclaimer: I was looking at the online version on the internet archive, which possibly had weird/bad formatting compared to a real book version of this. it may have been missing certain images. (another pdf of it looks the same so idk!)

This book felt very weird? it's a book about drawing but it's really text heavy and it's really hard to visualize the stuff it is explaining because the illustrations that go along with the text are pretty painfully unhelpful. The text is way too dense and only comprehensible if you already know anatomy, which you probbaly don't if you're picking this book up.

[window · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's really great for learning a specific kind of anatomy, but it's almost like a personal, little journal with notes that aren't that intelligible to anyone else. More useful for the pictures than the anatomy lessons. His other book about life drawing is much more effective at explaining specific characteristics of good figure construction. This one is more about the eye candy and good to copy from. I love the line quality.

[Dana · Rating 5 out of 5]

very useful.

[☆ · Rating 4 out of 5]

I must say that this book work is indeed commendable! It is truly remarkable for its utilization as a point of reference in the field of art, particularly in augmenting one's understanding of anatomy. Evidently, it imparts pivotal information regarding human anatomy, shedding light upon common errors often made by individuals.
Nevertheless, allow me to raise a singular concern regarding the occasional amalgamation of visual depictions despite the implementation of numerical detailing. However, I solemnly affirm that such an issue stems solely from my personal visual impairments and remains entirely unrelated to any shortcomings within the book itself.

[Mephistopheles · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is absolutely fabulous, and, unusually for an art book, the text is better than the pictures, which were quick, dirty, and instructive, but without finesse. So many lights went off in my brain when reading – highly, highly recommended.

[Daniel Brito · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very informative.

The book is good and full of anatomy technical lingo. I can recommend this book for medium to advance artists looking to get more knowledge about anatomy and how to draw it, but not for the absolute beginners like myself .

[Arman Behrad · Rating 3 out of 5]

Mannequinization strategy for instructing surface anatomy is so clever and efficient. I’ll hope that Biologist inspire more from Artist.

[avery · Rating 3 out of 5]

if you’re looking for an anatomy book to learn how to draw ALL types of people, look somewhere else because this will not help you.

this is about 50% helpful to me at best. it explains the technical ways the body works + how that corresponds visually, and it also explains all the little parts that make up our body that you may not have thought of otherwise. HOWEVER, it strictly depicts and caters towards the male body, establishing it as the “default.” the only body type that is shown is that of a muscular man, which CAN be helpful to see how the muscles look through the exaggerated forms in these illustrations *i guess,* but some more variation would’ve been..helpful.

this book will be a helpful reference for me at times when drawing stuff like arms and legs and occasionally the torso, but it’s extremely dated and is definitely lacking in a lot of areas. also! there’s racism that shows up out of nowhere.

there are plenty of better anatomy books out there that are far more up to date and better explain + depict how to draw various body types and how to draw both men AND women. this book has more of a “classical” approach i guess, and there are definitely things to learn from it, but i’ve definitely read more well-rounded and comprehensive anatomy books before this one.

[Sonya Ball · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bridgeman is one of the leading authorities on the human figure, that being said, this book is one of the best he ever created on anatomy and drawing the figure. The illustrations are clear and easy to follow along with his techniques for drawing the human figure. This is a classic on figure drawing and I highly recommend it as a companion book to any other textbook on the subject. Not for beginning students though, it's definitely an advanced text.

[Debra Hahn · Rating 5 out of 5]

A Artist Reference

This is one great book for studying and for referencing groups of muscles,
Or a particular muscle to a group or position on the human body. For people
Who love to draw or sculpture the human body. Its even great for medical
Students. This kept on my drawing board for reference for my own
Sketching and drawings.
Debra H.

[Viki · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's dated, rambling, and racist, but still has valuable insight on drawing the human form and structural anatomy, though the terms are dated. I still recommend getting "Bridgman's Complete Guide to Drawing from Life" instead of this book, as it contains 97% of this book plus a lot more. What is left out is not a loss

[fntbia · Rating 3 out of 5]

The descriptions, the names of certain bones and muscles especially, went in and straight out. Nonetheless, I feel like it's gonna be useful to have the illustrations close at hand whenever I'm drawing and get into a lil "what the fuck is going on here?" problem. As for me, it's better than asking google.

[Kathy Jiang · Rating 4 out of 5]

It’s good for what it is (a smallish book): a collection of sketches of body parts with a focus on joints and how the body is built. Detailed, but clear written explanations on each aspect it’s focusing on. All drawings are of white people or body parts of indistinguishable ethnicity.

[Mia · Rating 5 out of 5]

Whenever I take a longer break from drawing and come back feeling like I have two left hands, this always sets me right again. I'll unashamedly say I don't even read what it says, I just copy the drawings and try to understand them and their construction 😅

[Danan Swanson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Incredible resource and library of anatomical knowledge, but as a book, the structure of text vs image juxtaposition is poorly harmonized. Better integration between these 2 components would have produced clearer communication of these ideas.

[Thảo · Rating 4 out of 5]

Một quyển để học về anatomy rất ổn. Cơ mà, có đoạn, phải chửi rủa, bớ ông Bridgman, sao mà có mấy cái trên trời dị ông ơi.
Thật là, nhiều lúc master viết cũng chưa hẳn là đúng, k áp được việc học của bản thân đâu....
Vì điểm này, trừ 0.5, dành tặng sách 4,5 sao thoy.

[Keelan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Once you see how the forms interlock you can't unsee it. But I will say this is best studied with other anatomy books; Bridgman has a very specific way of drawing that can lend its qualities to your own style. Which isn't always as desirable as it might seem.

[Bruno Ports · Rating 5 out of 5]

went through it once sketching all drawings, and it definitely has some key teachings and emphasis that provoke a sense o movement to anatomy of the body. Didn't like the face part though, they look like marble statues faces.

[Dor · Rating 4 out of 5]

Decent

Decent art book. Good for beginning ish folks and a good refresher I guess. Not the book I thought it would be.

[Gold · Rating 5 out of 5]

Perfect

[Konstantine · Rating 4 out of 5]

bridgmans method of constructing the body like pieces from the skeleton is really useful, i do wish the illustrations defined it a bit better but the lessons are pretty rich

[Kris B · Rating 4 out of 5]

I think I'll have to come back to this when I learn a bit more, but I still learned some valuable information!

[Michaell Cavllaro · Rating 5 out of 5]

SHORT READ

Although this book is a short read, it is packed with many illustrations, and goes into great detail about the human anatomy

[Paul Nasca · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good framework for breaking down complex shapes.

[Mark Feiler · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great book on the construction of the anatomy of man. Classic!

[Alfie Hadden · Rating 5 out of 5]

Brilliant art and quite easy to follow for one of the hardest art challenges

[haven ⋄ f (hiatus) · Rating 4 out of 5]

great resource for drawing anatomy. i didnt really read the text but my guess is that it explains what muscles do what

[Alice Pickersgill · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good portable guide book for anatomy, portraits, and figure drawings. Some of the text is a little dated with the generalisation of people of different races and genders.

[Dominic Zito · Rating 5 out of 5]

Extremely helpful, the book itself is small enough for me to take it with me everywhere. Very helpful if I wanna draw something and need a reference