TATE Collection III: Drawing

As a simple chart, experiment with each of the pencils, seeing the quality and tonality of each one. The graphite is harder and greyer and the charcoal softer and more grainy. Try to be fluid with the way that the marks appear on the paper and practice until it looks easy.

Experiment with your coloured pencils, exploring ways to overlap and layer to tint and colour the paper. Work lighly to create different colour atmospheres. This will be useful to refer to later on.

Now start to see what will happen if you draw with each of the pencils and charcoal pencils, by varying the pressure and holding the pencils in different ways you can smudge and overlap marks to create beautiful marks. This will be useful to refer to when you draw from the John Singer Sargent.

Create a simple line drawing from the portrait of Polly Barnard. Using one pencil, lightly map out the position of marks. Allow your marks to be delicate and fluid, letting the marks break and curve. This is called an underdrawing, and you can develop these marks later

Now work over this drawing with more varied and heavier marks using the charcoal and pencils to define and exaggerate the marks. Try not to over do it as one of the beautiful things with Singer Sargent’s drawings is the economy of line and delicacy. The drawings are wispy and made quite fast.

Working very lightly over the whole surface of your paper, use your colouring pencils to create a surface of delicate, marks, tinting the paper and making it richer. You are now extending the drawing and seeing if you can add to it, by increasing the variety of marks and trying out your pencils in different ways you will find some exciting effects.