I positioned myself and my easel in front of a tall mirror. Reading the brief, and following my previous disappointments getting tied into producing too much detail, I set some rules. No erasing, 5 – 10 minute sketches, letting the pencil trace around my face as explained in the handbook, barely looking at the paper. The first attempt increased my confidence no end. It came together as a face, and maybe a not bad likeness. Larger than A2.
Drawing two. Faster this time. Eyes are too close together, forehead too short but it came together without measurement.
A day later. 5 minutes. A change of hair and clothes, again no erasing. Note to self, start below the middle of the paper. I’m having the most success starting from the nose.
After producing drawing 2, I decided to work over a layer of tone in charcoal, approaching my face as a three dimensional object, not even thinking about features, just direction of line and light. It’s really hard to recognise your mistakes when making a drawing, you get involved thinking that what you are producing is a perfect likeness, then on standing back wondering how things went so wrong during reproduction.
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