avocare

My head drawing class starts next week and for those of you further out I have a video demo coming soon. Otherwise here's a step by step charcoal drawing for you to have a look at: I've darkened the line drawing significantly here so you can see it, the original is very light. There's a little bit of red prismacolor lay in then a Ritmo B charcoal pencil. Lay in with a compressed charcoal stick. Half tones blended in. This is all done with my fingers guys, it's not a pretty process but it's the way I like it. Finishing with compressed charcoal, a Pitt Charcoal pencil for details and a kneaded eraser for highlights. .

Last weekend I gave a lecture at the Norman Rockwell Museum in Stockbridge Massachusetts.  The following is an excerpt from what future generations shall call my NRM Manifesto (unless the NRM lawyers demand that I remove their name, which is quite possible):  Anyone with the courage to take a fresh look at the role of art in the 20th century might reasonably conclude illustration has played a more significant role than "fine" art. Yeah, you heard me-- more significant than Picasso, Matisse, Jackson Pollack and the great Jeff Koons combined. Absurd?  Perhaps.  But let's explore the issue as soberly and conscientiously as we are able, and see where the facts take us. We should start by agreeing there are many legitimate methods of measuring the importance of art.  For me, the least satisfying method seems to be the most popular: to blindly accept the conventions of our grandparents who instinctively assigned a lower social status to "commercial" ill...