Drawing lessons

A few shots from the last few weeks with one of my private students. So much growth happens during private lessons, each lesson directs what we will do next. A spontaneous portrait in a printmaking project  a few weeks ago turned into a few weeks of observational drawing. Instead of tackling the whole portrait we focused on the individual features.

Week 1, the top left eye was the first attempt with no instruction, a 5 minute drawing. The larger eye took 45 minutes of very careful observation. The nose sketches were done the following week.

My 9 year old student did such an awesome job on his eye I decided we should turn it into a collage piece. We assembled a variety of elements and then edited to make the final composition.

This is the completed project as a collage. We considered composition, color palette, texture but making sure that the focus of the finished project was always  the drawing of the eye. Its really easy to get lost in all the pretty papers and possibilities.

Here's a shot of the engraving that started the whole project. I love the spontaneity of the drawing. It was also a good reminder to do a lesson on portraits.