Four lessons from the two month drawing unit

This first lesson introduced the method of using textures and patterns can delineate space and shape instead of lines. There are often hidden images created by the variations in pattern.

This lesson was accompanied by a history of Islamic art and its origins in Greek mathematics. Accompanying it was a survey of Polynesian, Maori and Australian art, and how complex patterns were also used in Eastern European folk art.

 

During the second lesson, the students learned to capture mass and gesture by drawing a figure model who posed for 10 second to 5 minute at a time. They explored line weight and several different drawing techniques.

This third lesson was intended to teach the basics of drawing the face. It included a history of portraiture and ideas of physical beauty throughout history. Students used different drawing techniques and trying to create a realistic self portrait.

This fourth assignment in the unit was to learn 1 and 2 point perspective, understand how changes in line weight, texture and value can create atmospheric perspective then use those techniques, with those learned in the previous units to illustrated a scene from their lives that contradicted how adults viewed them.

This lesson was also accompanied by a history of illusionary space from ancient Egypt to Western Abstraction, relevant geometry and examples of technical drawings. I touched on views toward representative imagery in different versions of Islam and Christianity, then concluded with samples of illusionary space from cultures in China, Central America, Australia. 

 If you look closely you can see depictions of  lost faith, loneliness, aggression, confusion, and betrayal.