Training the Eye

There's so much to be learned from doing a white-on-white drawing on charcoal-toned paper. This exercise really trains the eye to look carefully for differences in value. It's those subtle transitions from dark to light, and vice-versa, that create three-dimensionality in a drawing.

Looking for the shapes of shadows, not just amorphous shaded "areas" will create credible volume in the objects you draw. The sensitive drawing above was done by Kristhy, a ninth grader. She successfully established a consistent light source, coming from the right, and carefully analyzed the shapes of cast shadows on the tabletop. Notice especially how Kristhy looked for the shapes of shadows on the objects.

Kristhy worked on this excellent drawing for several hours - time well spent in training her eye to observe carefully.

Revisiting Molly

In a previous post, I presented drawing-on-toned-paper lesson, and showed Jen's drawing of her Scottish terrier, Molly:

http://leonasartclass.blogspot.com/2011/09/drawing-what-you-lovesketching-scottie.html.

Although she was pleased with her results, Jen felt she could go further with her drawing. We both thought the darks could be emphasized more, and Molly's eyes needed to be darker as well.

We also used a nifty tool called an artist's bridge. It's a small transparent raised shelf to rest your drawing hand on, instead of leaning directly on your paper. It helps to keep the charcoal from accidentally smudging, & you can still see your work through the clear acrylic bridge.

With a little more work and thought, Jen was able to give her drawing more impact and depth. There are a couple of important lessons in this process of re-evaluating one's work:

* Sometimes we need some distance and time to evaluate our work.

* As artists, we need to be open to making improvements or changes in our work.

Here's Jen's finished version of the portrait of Molly. Beautiful job, Jen.

Drawing Inspiration

I recently saw two beautiful drawing exhibits at The Morgan Library & Museum in New York. "David, Delacroix and Revolutionary France" consists of 80 drawings from 1789-1852, an extremely fertile period in French art. These incredible works are on loan (only at this venue) from The Louvre until December 31st.

The second exhibit, "Ingres at the Morgan," is a group of The Morgan's holdings of drawings by iconic draftsman Jean-Auguste Dominique Ingres (1780-1867), and it's on view until November 27th. The drawings he made as a 13 year old student are astonishing.

The skill demonstrated in all these drawings is phenomenal, and the sensitivity of line, the subtlety of tonal range and mastery of simple media (graphite, chalk, watercolor) are dauntingly magnificent. The drawings live and breathe before one's very eyes.

The exhibits at The Morgan answer the question, "Are drawings done as preparation for paintings?" Well, sometimes they are, but they are undeniably exquisite ends in themselves.

Don't miss this rare opportunity!

The Value of White-On-White

In previous posts, I've written about the process of creating a toned-paper charcoal drawing. High school students made animal drawings, and Jen drew her Scotty dog, Molly, by first applying charcoal all over the paper, and then drawing lines on top of that layer with soft charcoal. Next, tones or values of gray were added and blended, and a kneaded eraser was used to remove charcoal to gradually create lighter values or whites.

I love teaching this flexible method of drawing to both children and adults, because it's so easy to make changes in your drawing this way. It's a thoughtful process of making judgements about the "darkness" and "lightness" you want to show. Sometimes the color of an object makes it confusing as to how the light source is affecting it. That's why I like this technique of drawing groups of white objects on a white cloth. It helps the artist concentrate on light and shadow, and therefore helps to achieve three-dimensionality.

"How do I make it look real?" There are no fancy tricks. It's all about taking your time to make careful observations, critical judgements and keeping an open mind. My students often spend several hours working on white-on-white drawings, and they're invariably happy with the results.

WHITE-ON-WHITE DRAWING FROM OBSERVATION

Materials:

White drawing paper of good quality, 16"x20" or 18"x24"

Soft willow charcoal

Kneaded eraser

Paper towels

Spray fixative

Procedure:

1. Set up a group of white objects on a table with strong light from a lamp on one side. Consider using white eggs, white cups or bowls, white boxes, etc., and arrange them on a white cloth with a white background.

2. What to look for before you begin:

*Notice how the shapes of the shadows form around the objects and lead your eye from one thing to the next.

*Notice how it's the value (degree of darkness) that separates one object from another, not dark "outlines."

*Be open to seeing not only the shadows cast on the tabletop, but also the shadows on the actual objects.

3. Now tone your paper: using the side of a short piece of charcoal, make broad, dark strokes on the paper, evenly covering the whole surface. It helps to work on top of a pad of paper for smooth application.

4. Using a paper towel, gently smooth and blend the charcoal as evenly as possible all over the paper. If too much charcoal is removed, just apply more, and smooth it again.

5. Draw light lines with your charcoal, and make decisions and changes as you go, always comparing the size and placement of drawn objects to what you actually see in front of you.

6. Start putting in large areas of darks where you see then in the set-up. Keep comparing and varying the degree of darkness to approximate as closely as possible what you see. Sometimes you need to do more looking than drawing!

7. "Pull out" any light areas you see, using your finger tips or your eraser. You can squeeze the kneaded eraser into pointed or knife-edged shapes to erase small areas that are hard to reach with fingers.

8. You can work back and forth from dark to light and vice-versa, until you are finished. When all your objects look consistently lit from one side, and all the shadows are consistently cast on the opposite side, your drawing will look convincingly three-dimensional.

9. In a well ventilated area, or outside, spray your drawing lightly with fixative to prevent smudging.

I can't overemphasize how important it is to allow yourself the time to really look at your set-up of objects and be open to changing your mind about your drawing, or comparing degrees of darkness. Keep looking!

Amy with her white-on-white drawing - beautiful work!

Drawing What You Love/Sketching Scottie

When Jen wanted to make a drawing of her delightful Scottish terrier, Molly, I suggested she use a photograph of her dog for reference. We worked with the same toned paper technique I taught to a group of high school students in my Drawing Animals lesson.

After toning her paper, Jen drew Molly's features with charcoal lines. Then she established all the darkest shapes on Molly's face by making intuitive repeated bold strokes within those areas, suggesting fur. She achieved beautifully loose movement and texture with this approach. Jen also used her kneaded eraser to remove the charcoal in selected areas of her drawing, establishing lighter tones, as well as near-whites.

Jen's close familiarity with her dog contributed meaning and enthusiasm to the process of drawing Molly. When you decide what to draw, think about using something or someone close to you as your subject. Try using this charcoal-toned paper technique to draw animals, people, landscapes or still lifes. It's a very forgiving process that allows for easy modifications and changes. To change a line, just rub it out with your finger or a paper towel, and redraw it.

I really love drawing with charcoal, & I created a series of large drawings of fruits and vegetables, including the charcoal diptych drawing, "Three Peppers." I'm thrilled that based on this drawing, I was recently awarded a solo exhibition at John Slade Ely House New Haven in September 2012!

Here are the steps for making a toned paper charcoal drawing:

TONED PAPER DRAWING

Materials:

soft willow charcoal in 1 1/2" lengths

white drawing paper

kneaded eraser

paper towels

photograph for reference, optional

spray fixative

Procedure:

1. Using the side of your charcoal, make broad, dark strokes on the paper, covering the whole surface. It helps to work on top of a pad of paper for smooth application.

2. Using a paper towel, gently smooth and blend the charcoal as evenly as possible all over the paper. If too much charcoal is removed, just apply more, and smooth it again.

3. Draw the basic shapes of your subject, and fill in the dark areas with charcoal. You can blend and lighten any areas with your finger or paper towel. Also, use your kneaded eraser to "pull out" charcoal in order to create very light areas. Keep adding darks, middle tones and lights, to establish a three-dimensional representation of your subject.

4. In a well ventilated area, lightly spray the fixative on your drawing to prevent smudging.

"Molly" by Jen

"Painting" with Tissue Paper

This wonderful technique combines drawing, bleeding tissue paper and glue to create a colorful one of a kind painting. You can find two different kinds of colored art tissue paper in art supply stores. One type keeps its color when wet, and the other type "bleeds" its color out when wet. Using bleeding tissue paper for this project will allow the colors to run and blend into each other in beautifully unpredictable ways.

You can see my video lesson on Tissue Paper Painting here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qwICGuREYAU

Here's how you make one.

TISSUE PAPER PAINTING

Materials:

white recycled mat board or cardboard, 9"x12" or larger

pencil with eraser

Thick black permanent Sharpie pen

Bleeding tissue paper, assorted colors, torn into small pieces

White glue

Old brush

Small recycled plastic container for water

Water

Procedure:

1. Cover your work surface or table with a plastic tablecloth or newspaper to protect it.

2. Using your pencil, do a line drawing on the white board, keeping your lines simple and bold.

3. Go over the pencil lines with a thick Sharpie pen. Erase any stray pencil lines.

4. In your plastic container, make a mixture of 2/3 glue and 1/3 water. Stir with a brush.

5. Working a small area at a time, paint the glue mixture onto the board, apply a small piece of the bleeding tissue paper on top of the glue, and paint another coat of glue on top of the tissue. The pieces of tissue should overlap, creating transparent mixed colors, and the colors will also bleed into each other and onto the white board. Allow your tissue shapes to fall outside the black lines once in a while.

6. Continue this process, until you have covered most of the board with colored tissue. If you wish, some white spaces may be left uncolored. When the glue mixture is wet, the colors may appear cloudy, but once it's dry, it will look clear.

7. Don't forget to wash the glue mixture out of your brush very thoroughly.

8. Allow the board to dry overnight. If thin boards buckle when dry, they can be flattened by placing the completely dry board under some heavy books for a couple of days. You may want to mount your "painting" on a larger board of a contrasting color to frame it for display.

Graham's Tissue Paper Painting

Under the Sea - Watercolor Resist

It was a pleasure working with seven year old Rachel last week on an "Under the Sea" watercolor resist painting. Rachel's concentration and inclusion of detail paid off in the beautiful results she achieved. Brava, Rachel!

Here's how we did it:

UNDER THE SEA WATERCOLOR RESIST

Materials:

Watercolor paper, approx 11"x15"

Oil pastels, select any light and bright colors, except for dark blue

Blue liquid watercolor paint

Thick watercolor brush

Water container & water

Water spray bottle, optional

Procedure:

1. Using oil pastels, draw an imaginary underwater scene, including any of the following: fish, whales, sharks, crabs, eels, sand, seaweed, coral, bubbles... and use imaginary colors and patterns.

2. Make your lines bold and solid by pressing hard as you draw, and go over your lines a second time to make a thick layer of oil pastel on the paper. Be sure to leave some areas on your paper white.

3. Dip your brush into the liquid watercolor, and let it gently glide right over your drawing. You'll notice that your bright oil pastels lines resist the watercolor, and will pop out from the watercolor wash. Use plenty of paint, and allow puddles to form and dry in place.

4. While the paint is still damp, you can create interesting patterns by using the water spray bottle to squirt a few random sprays on your painting. (Don't overdo this step, as too much water will dilute your blue paint.)

5. Allow your painting to dry flat.

Drawing Animals: Kittens & Whales & Giraffes, Oh My!

Last week I taught a "How to Draw Animals" lesson to a group of high school students. Most of the students provided their own reference photographs to work from. Having the students copy their reference materials, would have produced acceptable results, but I wanted the students to get the most mileage out of this one-day project, and go beyond copying.

First, I discussed and demonstrated how to look for the main shapes of a subject, whether it's an object in a still life, a landscape or an animal. I advised them to look for and establish the shape of the animal's largest part first (usually its body), and draw an abstract shape, such as a rectangle or oval to approximate it. Then, keeping aware of relative size, distances apart and gesture, the other body parts could be added as general abstract shapes as well. I explained that while developing the drawing, the artists would be able to keep refining their judgements to make appropriate changes, as they gradually added detail.

Next I introduced the students to the process of working with vine charcoal and kneaded erasers on white paper toned with charcoal. First each student covered his/her paper with a layer of dark tone, using soft vine charcoal. This was smoothed over lightly with a paper towel. Then, using the same charcoal sticks, they drew the basic shapes for their animals. As the drawings progressed, I showed the artists how to use their erasers as drawing tools to "pull out" whites from the paper, and to blend grays. Erasers could also be used to add light strokes for background texture or fur. Fingers were also very useful for blending, adding and subtracting values and practically "sculpting" the darks and lights.

None of the students had used this drawing approach before, and all found it satisfyingly forgiving, effective and fun. Many of the artists were pleasantly surprised with their results, and parents and other adults were surprised at the sophisticated level of work that was accomplished in only two hours.

You can use this technique of initially toning the paper to draw an animal, a portrait, a still life, a landscape, a seascape or an abstract fantasy. Your fingers and eraser will be a mess, but you can always clean up, and I think you'll really enjoy the results.

The Students' Drawings

Drawing/Painting - Father/Daughter

Last week, Isabella and her father, Goran, took an art lesson together at my studio. This father/daughter team have bonded over exploring the art process together for many years. While they worked with me in the studio, the respect and love they have for each other was obvious.

Isabella worked on an acrylics still life painting from observation, while Goran did a powerful charcoal drawing based on a childhood memory. They worked independently, but also supported each other's efforts, as they shared a creative moment together.

At the end of the lesson, Goran paid me a high compliment when he said, "Thank you for transporting me to a different place." Art has the potential to take us on wonderful journeys.

Art & Musical Instruments

I hung an exhibition of my students' wonderful drawings of an antique tuba today. It was important for the artists to concentrate & keep looking carefully at the tuba to make a convincing drawing of it. Since the tuba has about sixteen feet of bent tubing and three valves, it's a very challenging object to draw. I'm so proud of my students, from first grade through sixth who made excellent drawings.

If you play a musical instrument, or if your family has an old instrument, whether it's guitar, drums, violin or piano, you might be inspired to draw that instrument. It's really fun to draw something you're interested in. With parent's permission, place the instrument on the floor in front of you, and concentrate only on what you see, not what you KNOW is there.

Begin using a pencil and an eraser, and finish your drawing with markers, pastels, colored pencils, watercolors, or any combination of materials. Try looking for darker parts, where there are shadows, lighter parts, and details, such as valves, keys, and strings, which can be shown in your drawing. Are certain parts of the instrument in front of others? Can you draw the closest parts showing that they hide what's behind them?

Have fun enjoying your musical instrument, not only for the beautiful notes it can produce, but also as something great to draw.

Drawing on Vacation

I've used some of the free time during my school Spring Break to work on some large charcoal still life drawings. Drawing is an ongoing exercise in learning to observe carefully and record what you see. When kids ask me how to become better at drawing, I usually say, "Draw, Draw, Draw!" The more you draw, the better you train your eye to really see.

You can keep a small sketchbook, pencils and an eraser in a backpack, or in the car, and sketch scenes you see, places you visit, or things you imagine. These drawings can be developed in more detail later on, or simply stand as a record of your ideas and experiences.

Sketchbooks keep your work neat and organized, whereas loose papers tend to get lost or discarded. If you don't own a sketchbook, you can make a simple one by stapling together a small stack of recycled white paper. You can even make covers for your book, by using colored papers for the top and bottom of your stapled stack. Keep drawing...

More About Obama Drawings

When we made Barack Obama drawings in school (see previous post), I taped a sheet of clear acetate over each child's picture. Then we used permanent black Sharpie pens to write short, inspiring quotes from our new president on the acetate, placing the words in a graphically interesting spot over the drawing. Students also used the Sharpie's to outline images, or to add details on the acetate layer. These became magical drawings in two layers: the bottom paper layer in Art Stix colors, and the overlay piece of acetate, with black Sharpie words of Obama's, and drawing additions. Sounds a little more complicated than it really is... They turned out quite well, & I'm thinking of sending some of the finished pieces to President Obama.

Drawing Inauguration Day

In school this week, my art classes (grades 1-6) are making wonderful drawings of our newly inaugurated President, Barack Obama, and are showing some of the important work our country will undertake under his leadership. The students are including famous quotes by President Obama in their drawings.

You may also want to do some drawings that remind you of our historic Presidential Inauguration Day. Some things you could include are the American flag, the White House, the Obama family, the world globe and people of all colors celebrating.

We used Art Stix and colored pencils to make our drawings, but you could use colored markers, crayons or oil pastels too. Your drawing will be a great reminder of a special day in American history.

101 ideas in the Idea Bank

"What should I draw"? In my school Art Studio, I often see kids who need help thinking of something to draw. I created a classroom Idea Bank to help kids find inspiring subject matter for their art. 

Similarly, I've created an Idea Bank on this blog, filled with lots of fun subjects kids can use to begin a drawing - in fact, there are 101 different ideas to choose from. Each time you click on the idea button, you'll see a new idea pop up. Choose the idea you like best, and make a drawing with lots of beautiful colors and details. 

Draw big, and fill the space on your paper. You can draw with any tools you like - crayons, oil pastels, colored pencils, markers... Try to keep all your drawings in a sketch book so they won't get lost. More about sketch books later.

Keep drawing, and do try this at home!