You're An Original

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CCS's budding artists will be studying and making portraits this Fall. This process will entail students looking at and discussing qualities of well-known portraits, working with a variety of media and techniques and eventually creating a self-portrait to display in the CCS Hallway Gallery. Moms and Dads will want to be on the look out for sales on picture frames this year.


Before Drawing, Seeing

I can explain to someone exactly how to draw a circle, but if I place a circle before them and ask them to draw it and they draw a square… well, that is all about seeing and not drawing. The ability to see, and after that the ability to render what you see… that has to be developed. For most that means a lot of drawing and a lot of looking.

The ability to see doesn’t spring up overnight, and I often tell eager young artists they have about 500 or so bad drawings in them they have to draw out first before they start noticing the subtle things that hide inside the human face.

Every building, no matter how complex, starts out with a foundation and framework. Look at this simple drawing:




Place these shapes in their proper relationship, and you have a human face. It really is that simple. Drawing the shapes accurately, so they recognizably represent the subject’s features, is the basis for a good likeness. Beyond that is nothing but details… things like dimples, wrinkles, eyelashes, cheekbones, etc. They are the decor to your building… the millwork, furniture and drapery that makes the place unique and filled with life. Without the strong foundation, however, it can all come tumbling down.

The Young Schoolmistress
probably c.1735-6
Jean-Siméon Chardin
 (1699 - 1779)
The National Gallery, London

In closing, Jean-Siméon Chardin’s painting "The Young Schoolmistress" inspires a meditation on learning and hopefully leads the child to ask God, “Help me to listen to everybody who is good and wise and not think that I already know everything.”