So recently I sat down and focused on doing some portraits. I chose to do them in my huge A3 sketchbook and for models I chose my regular ladies: the mail order catalogue girls. It is exactly what it sounds like: just open a mail order catalogue that has people in it (in my case mostly women) and draw them. They stand perfectly still, they are professionals after all. ;-)
First I did four sketches in a brown graphite stick:
I found it challenging to work big and as you can see I have a lot more trouble with a three quarter view than a full frontal one. I did like working with the graphite though. The third one is my favorite by the way.
The next day I wanted to take it a step further and do a watercolour portrait. The paper in the sketchbook is not suitable for watercolour, so I got out some watercolour paper of a somewhat smaller size and tried to capture another girl.
I enjoyed the play with paints and trying to layer onto previous layers to get it looking at least a little bit right. I'm not a great watercolourist, so this is about the best I could do.
I used to draw women and girls all the time, but now I hadn't done it in quite a while and I feel like I grew out of it a little. There's only so many hours in a day after all and if one is obsessed with patterns and such, those take priority over everything else. It's however good to keep your art muscle flexible and versatile.
Hope you are doing something different every now and then to keep things interesting and wishing you all a wonderful and artsy day.