Beginning to Draw
Posted by pangaeaa on July 19, 2008
By Artacademy.com
Acquiring a solid foundational skill-set for drawing takes about three to six months of dedicated study and practice.
In your initial study the most important skill to be developed is the ability to strike the arabesque with a consistent accuracy of shape and proportion.
Everything else builds upon and is a refinement of this one all-important skill.
The critical matrix of skills that the beginner artist needs to acquire is the ability to accurately assess proportion and shape and the understanding of rendering plastic form (which is the illusion of 3-dimensionality in realist drawing).
Accurately assessing and drawing an object’s outside shape is called striking the arabesque.
Other terms for this are contour, mise en trait, and outline. I prefer the term arabesque as it implies a dynamic gestural rhythm imparting a sense of life into one’s drawing.
Acquiring the ability to consistently strike an accurate arabesque is the singular foundation upon which your drawing and painting skills are subsequently built and honed.
For the beginner this is the first important skill to be learned.
This all-important skill is easily learned by working through a series of deceptively simple exercises that quickly build up your powers of observation and spatial awareness.
The next drawing lesson for the beginner is to learn how to accurately gauge the internal proportions of their subject. This is establishing, or fixing, the placement of the major land-marks. In portrait drawing this would be the features (eyes, nose, hairline, etc.).
Once the beginner has a working competency in striking the arabesque and fixing the landmarks in their drawing the subsequent skill to be developed is rendering tone. Rendering tone, more commonly known as shading, is what creates the illusion of 3-dimensional reality in your drawing.
Rendering tone convincingly requires the drawing skills of blocking in, cross-hatching, edging (soft & hard), understanding the effects of light, lifting out and stumping in.
This illusion of 3-dimensional reality is called plasticity. Plasticity is defined as giving form to an object.
The artist lacking these skills will quickly realize their importance as they continue to struggle with their drawing over and over again.
Do you find yourself struggling with the same issues in every drawing? Is the proportion in your drawing always a bit off, or the shape doesn’t look quite right. Is your shading (tone) scratchy and unconvincing? These drawing problems are the same for every beginner.
The critical foundational skills of accurately striking the arabesque and convincingly rendering tone can be acquired – when properly taught.
And this is the important distinction.
As a beginner your initial focus should be on acquiring the drawing skill of striking the arabesque. This is a two-part process: first, you need to learn how to accurately adjudge proportion; second, assessing shape is the next step.
Possessing the singular skill of accurately striking an arabesque is the most important lesson the beginner can acquire. It is this skill that most people equate with drawing ‘talent’. Yet striking an arabesque is easily learned.
