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There are a number of misconceptions that I held about drawing and painting when I started taking art classes at Studio Incamminati, among them that really good artists don't have to make corrections to their work. Various instructors here have corrected me on this, explaining that drawing and painting...
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Attitude by Patricia Hannaway, 2006, pastel sketch drawing, 21 x 12. Human figure sketching, especially learning how to sketch from a model, is one of the most rewarding ways of practicing art because it can enhance your abilities in ways that are both practical and inspirational. It's practical...
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Can you imagine figuring out how to draw a face—the same face—350 times or more, and making each portrait drawing different and as compositionally sound and interesting as if you had made only one? Quite a task, yet Italian designer, sculptor, and painter Piero Fornasetti did just that. Fornasetti...
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Drawing is a fundamental skill for artists, emphasis on "skill." That means there are basic drawing rules and approaches that work, including these six tips on how to draw anything accurately. Delmonico Building by Charles Sheeler, 1926, lithograph drawing. Adapted from an article by M. Stephen...
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Okay, I'm going to share with you my dirty little secret: I can't parallel park a car. Well, I can parallel park a car as long as I've got three blank spaces, in a pinch two, and it helps that I drive a Honda Fit. But for the most part I'm willing to drive blocks out of the way and walk...
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Whenever I go to the doctor and get my finger pricked, I'm always surprised at how much it hurts--at how sensitive the tips of our fingers are. Yet at the same time, they are so utilitarian. Judith Ann Braun's work uses both these qualities of fingers--their sensitivity and their strength--in...
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I have a painter-friend who is gearing up to do a major work with figures, but she feels a bit rusty about painting a model in all his or her glory. To help prepare herself, she's set up a series of life-drawing sessions so that she can spend a bit of time drawing models before tackling her actual...
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I'll admit that in the past I have been guilty of thinking of colored pencil art as colorful and bright and not necessarily able to be coupled with serious subjects or moody narratives. But that was my own bias. As I've spent time looking at sketchbooks of draftsmen creating colored pencil art...
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Susan Lyon's figure drawings truly set her apart artistically and are the foundation and preparation for all she creates as an oil painter. If you ask her why, it is a drawing's immediacy, directness, and drama that are the ideal conduits for her creative sensibilities and in her opinion these...
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In figure drawing and painting, knowing the ins and outs of the human body is essential. There's no way around that fact, and honing our skills with anatomy drawing helps us understand and truly see the body more accurately than any other endeavor. Drawing by Stephen Schultz. I was flipping through...
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That sounds gross, but in the hands of contemporary painter Alex Kanevsky, it's not. As a classically trained artist, Kanevsky's painting techniques and skills are strong. But the way he chooses to paint--in patches and broad swaths that lend a visual vibration to every inch of canvas--is not...
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Figuring out how to draw people is often a matter of breaking the body down into geometric shapes. When it comes to drawing people--specifically faces--you have to think of the sphere and the ovoid. Now, I'm not really a fan of looking at drawings of shapes. Booooooring. Instead, I study this concept...
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Okay, I'll admit that skull reading and phrenology sound a little silly to me. Trying to get a sense of a person from the hollows and grooves on their skull? Not buying it. But I do know that "reading" the skull as an artist is key when it comes to learning how to draw a human head for...
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Click the picture above to view your free video lesson on charcoal drawing. I was inspired recently when I went to an art gallery show and saw some wonderful charcoal drawings. For so many of us, charcoal lessons were part of our first explorations of art making, but to see these highly finished charcoal...
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I am writing this as things have never looked better for me financially, as an artist. I have had a few huge sales and wildly successful shows over the years, but I feel as if I have tapped into a new realm of possibilities in recent months. And this in a time of financial hardship for many across the...