Cream and Sugar

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My great-great grandma, Lily:

Grandma & Grandpa 

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Charcoal Drawing: Still Life

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I did this charcoal drawing in my drawing workshop. This professor teaches an Academic, realistic form of drawing.

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Sketching Possibilities

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A small sketch...

I drew this quick sketch in pen and colored it with pencil. I used the same photo reference of my great-grandma that I used [ here ].

I'm considering making this into a painting, but I haven't quite made up my mind.

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The Reveal: The Musician

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Here is the almost-finished painting of my great-great grandpa. The portrait itself is finished, but I may add a little more to the background, probably a subtle framework. 

The black is India ink painted with a brush or drawn on with pen. I used acrylics for the highlights.

This painting is 32"x47."

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Practice Makes Perfect (or good enough)

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I like to draw a few small portrait sketches before creating a "serious" drawing. 

These are pen sketches of my great-great grandma: 

At first I didn't like working with a pen, because I couldn't erase imperfections, and I couldn't blend as I would with pencil or charcoal, yet sometime during my college "career" I fell in love with the pen. I love the hatch marks that can be made, and it forces me to look very carefully at what I'm drawing. Each mark counts! If I make a mistake, I call it character. So it both encourages me to be careful with the marks that I make, and forces me to let go of my need for perfection.

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In the Band: Sneak Peek

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Here's a sneak peek of my latest portrait:

 For my surface, I stained a large piece of plywood that had been cut into an oval by a helpful friend; it's roughly 32"x40-something inches (I keep forgetting to measure it). 

This obviously is not the whole portrait, but I will be posting that soon!

Not the best photo in the world, but it's only a preview, after all. The bad quality shall serve to increase your suspense for the full portrait soon to follow.
Do you feel your suspense increasing? 

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