Week 1 of Portrait Art Class

Week 1 we were oriented to the classroom and the equipment that we would be using. For example, the easels, not everybody had used the wooden easels before so the tutor (Jess) took us through the safety aspects and how to size it to our requirements. We were also able to give it a try standing or in a seating position.

I started off standing but then my back started to hurt so I decided to sit instead; having been shown how at the beginning of the class, this was easily done without fuss or embarrassment.

Jess also took us through the fundamentals of drawing: The use of proportions, comparison, negative space, form and structure.

And straight away from week 1 we had a live model to draw from! The model had one pose for the full session which gave us plenty of time to get a drawing done, he was marked into place so that he was able to have little stretch rests and we had a tea break in the middle and the model was still able to get back into the exact same pose. (This is as opposed to figure drawing where they tend to do shorter poses for example 5 mins, 10 mins and 2 x 20 mins poses).

During the session Jess walks the class and offers tips, advice or just reassurance.