touch

Our last assignment for my illustration class was "touch" and to show different kinds of lines of varying weight and feel. This first drawing is obviously a self-portrait done with 4B pencil on a really nice drawing paper. Then I scanned it and added a little color in Illustrator. I didn't try to make it look beautiful, just soft, though now that I see it on here, the scan sort of makes it look rough. I'm just getting over my cold (hopefully) and feeling cold at the same time. Every so often I like to do a self-portrait because it seems to ground me, back to my real drawing and observing... and I'm the only one who would sit still for this long when I need a model! ;) I used to love Kathë Kollwitz's work in college (I still do). I feel like I know her when I see her self-portraits and I feel her pain of her life in Germany during the war. She is incredible at capturing the light... just look at the lips in this drawing:

I'm looking forward to continuing illustration classes in February and I'm trying something new in January (I'll tell you what that is soon enough!). I'm also considering doing an oil painting class focused on the winter landscape ... I have to make up my mind quick about that since it begins in January. Hope you are staying warm in these cold December days!