Art Academy London – Page 3 – Home Office Charm

My pictures paint a thousand… faces

My art class this week got us to practise our portrait painting with a live model. It was the first time I painted a portrait. I had always been nervous about painting humans. I somehow felt incompetent.

But I realised I had been here before when I got into it. Flashback: I trained to become a beauty therapist when I left school. And no, I was not a beauty school dropout. Instead, I did well. But what people don’t know about beauty training is the amount of anatomy and physiology you must learn. I had exams in the skeletal and muscular systems and cross-sections of the skin. When I told the art teacher about this, I found myself recounting the Latin names of the muscles of the face. Surprisingly I even told her about each muscle’s insertions and origins. Didnt realise I still remembered those pesky exam type answers.

Muscles of the faces
First portrait
Drawing using charcoal
Getting the feel of the block
Drawing using charcoal flat

It was illuminating how my prior experience of understanding what is happening behind faces and below the skin surface was really useful for my drawing. I also remembered the story of Leonardo Da Vinci studying anatomy. It seems he used to study cadavers. But my study of faces was not of dead people. They were the heads of 1000 facials I had done in my 20s in salons and spas in London and around the world.

It was nice to get encouragement to continue still-life drawings. I shall.

An unfinished life drawing of a life model in charcoal.

There is Still Life in My Pencil

Art & Illustration

I’m growing more confident and intrigued about my mark-making. I am confident because I managed to get some tutored practice last week at my regular new art classes. It is enlightening to see my finished works against others in the still life class.

Some artists go for realism, where their sketching looks exactly like a photo of the object. I’m in awe of those. However, others like me don’t. I struggle with getting it real. It might be that I don’t have the patience or the looking skill. But when I complained that my marks were not exactly like the set up to my teacher, instead of giving me tips to make it more real, she said that was what Van Gough did. This linking of my marking type to an old master reassured me. It also made me curious to see more of Van Gough’s work. Some of my favourites from Van Gough are below. I like the milk jug. As you can see, I show the screen grab with a ring around my favourite of his illustrations.

Sharpening my focus

Personal Reflections

I went back to basics and relearned drawing, and the strategies used to perfect the representation of the figure.

I learned the intricacies of negative space and what it is used for. I also learned the aligning with a kebab stick. And top tip note to self remember to imagine there is a plate of glass in front of you.

I also learned to insert scaffolding in the drawing to ensure you get the proportion right. All the things they didn’t teach me when I worked towards my A’level art all those decades ago. At least I cannot remember them teaching me. Perhaps when I was aged 15,16,17, I wasn’t listening to what I was taught. But the pictures below show.

I am listening now.