Quick portraits and second cousins | Portrait Drawing Update March | Moderately Competent
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- Опубліковано 6 вер 2024
- I said at the end of last month that my only goal for March was to just keep drawing portraits, and I at least managed that!
Things mentioned in this video:
Playlist of previous portrait videos here: • Learning to Draw Portr...
David Tenorio class on Sktchy: shop.sktchy.co... (As always, I will remind you that Sktchy have very frequent sales, and it is worth waiting for one.)
I am almost up to date with your videos! I haven't commented on all of them, but I am out here watching and cheering you on! My portrait drawings are terrible, BUT I had a drawing where someone recognized who I drew! So that's at least forward progress? I struggle with making faces too tall and too thin when drawing front facing portraits. I need to back track and re-learn the proportions and such for the facial features. BUT I also need to pick something and stick with it more consistently. I bounce all over the place from faces to hands to birds to flowers to landscapes to... you get the picture.
Hi Charlotte. I have just started watching your videos and I am really taken with them! Your tenacity and down to earth approach is so uplifting to watch. I have had no formal training but have been drawing and painting for many years. I wish I had had the idea to teach myself using your approach from the start. I am more than moderately competent now and enjoy seeing some of my paintings framed and on show. One thing that strikes me about your videos is that you don’t seem to be having fun or enjoying your art making. It seems more like you’re doing your homework every day !! I wonder if you set aside one day a week (or month!) to just draw what makes you happy and relaxed ? It doesn’t have to be great or useful - perhaps have a go at caricatures if you want to stay within the portrait field. Or go out into the garden and do something plein air? Perhaps splash some colour around using those wonderful geometric tree pictures you showed in a previous video? I will continue to watch your journey. Good luck and happy painting.
Hi! Thank you very much for your comment, it was really thought provoking. I ended up taking some time to think about it and then wrote you an essay in response 🤣.
Initially, I felt a bit defensive in response to your comment, even though I could see how well-intentioned it was. On reflection, though, I can definitely see where my videos might come across like I am pursuing my art practice like it is a chore to be done rather than in a spirit of joyful creativity. That's especially true of the series of videos about learning to draw portraits, because I find it SO HARD and my videos reflect my frustration with the many setbacks and difficulties I'm encountering.
I think there are two parts to my response: the first is that I think this impression is partly a UA-cam content organisation issue. I haven't talked so much about things I do just for fun because it hasn't really fit into the structure of the channel I've decided on so far. However, it's also fair to say that I do nothing for UA-cam that I wouldn't have done anyway -- everything that I'm doing is by choice and because I enjoy it, and not because I think it will make me popular or because it is some kind of cosmically ordained requirement to do these things in order to develop some artistic competence.
With this in mind, the second part to my answer is this: I think to a certain extent I have to ask you to trust that I organise how I spend time on this hobby for my own maximum enjoyment. I am someone who thrives on learning new things, and beginning to explore drawing and painting has turned out be a feast for me, in that there is SO MUCH to learn and try and investigate.
However, I totally see how my "skill development" oriented approach could seem quite dry or sterile to artists for whom drawing or painting has been a many-year-long source of joyful self-expression, rather than a voyage of skill exploration. I guess I have to ask you to believe that I find the things I'm doing fun and entertaining and joyful in my own way. I'll try to reflect that more in my videos, because it really is the truth.
Anyway, I could write a great deal more about my thoughts on this topic, but I will spare you! Thank you, though, for your comment, I appreciated how much it made me think!