This course is specifically designed to give the students interested in portraiture, a solid foundation on the subject and practice a variety of techniques.

In these three hours sessions, online course, we will, create artworks working from photos of models and casts or sculpture and, both male and female, creating a number of portraits in a variety of dry media and techniques essential for portraiture such as: graphite, charcoal, Conte crayons, reduction technique. The students will also be encouraged to work from life preparing self-portraits or portraits of family and friends as homework assignment, continuing practicing the techniques studied in class and further develop technical skills.

The techniques we will practice during these 4 weekly sessions, each lasting 3:00 hours, include those that are traditionally used for portraiture to obtain a good level of realism and detail but also quick preliminary sketches to study subject and composition, utilizing also modern approaches and materials such as markers, ballpoint pen and so on.

In addition to the techniques mentioned above, we will study the fundamentals of structure and anatomy of the head, measuring techniques, tonal rendering, effects of light on form, correct positioning of the facial features and their structural characteristics. A variety of drawing materials will also be discussed and used.

Materials:

• White paper: a pad of Strathmore Drawing medium finish or vellum or vellum finish, about 11”x14”; or a pad of Strathmore Bristol, same size and same surface; or a pad of Stonehenge Legion in white, same size.
• Toned paper: you can wait to buy the toned paper as we will be discussing various types of paper in class, but these are a few possibilities: a pad of Strathmore charcoal, 11” by 14” or bigger; or a few sheet of Fabriano Roma, Fabriano Ingres, Canson Mi-Teintes, Hahnemuhle or Strathmore Charcoal toned.
• Graphite pencils: traditional wood casing pencils or lead holders in gradations HB, B, 2B, 4B.
• Red earth colored pencils, (such as burnt sienna, sanguine, Venetian red or Indian red) black and white.
• Charcoal sticks in medium, soft and extra soft gradations. My favorite brand is Nitram, but you can use any charcoal brand you are used to. Do not use willow charcoal because it is too weak for our purposes. Compressed charcoal pencils in medium, soft and extra soft gradation, General’s is a very good and cheap brand. White chalk in pencils and-or sticks. Red earth pastels (Conte, Cretacolor or General’s).
• Kneaded eraser, pencil sharpener, sand paper.