Contour Drawing

Portrait of Igor Stravinsky, Pablo Picasso

Homework: 2 line worksheets due Friday (assigned earlier this week)

Classwork: Introduction to contour drawing. We've been studying line this week, so it makes sense to practice drawing lines to represent real subjects. Our subjects are close by; in fact, they are our non-drawing hands.

The rules of contour drawing:

1. Once your pencil hits the page, don't lift it. You're making one continuous line.

2. No erasing! If you think you've messed up, just go back and make another line that looks more like you want it to.

3. Your eyes and drawing hand move at the same speed - slooooowwwwly.

The second activity today helps people get into their right minds. I'm not joking! In general, the left side of the brain guides our logical thinking, judgment, mathematical and verbal skills. That side of the brain is a big help in most school subjects, but for art, we want to activate the right side of the brain: our creative, free-flowing, perceiving, wondering side. The upside-down drawing activity calms down the yammering critical left brain so the right brain can really see and draw what's there.

Thursday: finish Right Brain Drawings, intro to value and color