Realistic Portrait Drawing

This is an ideal course for beginner-intermediate students who want to learn or improve their portrait skills. No previous drawing training is required and it is perfect for new students or a continuation of previous portrait classes. The class meets virtually once a week for four consecutive weeks.

Students will learn how to represent a portrait realistically; learning in detail how to make and combine all the facial features to build a portrait. First, the students will draw the structure completing the remaining details later using several images as a visual reference.

The course will cover frontal and ¾ poses in male and female portraits without a model by looking at drawings. Students will learn to realistically represent the following aspects in a portrait: proportions, measurements, comparison, symmetry, structure and shading. Sketching will be used as warm up exercises and to capture face gestures.

Students are going to have constant evaluation during the classes while they are drawing, through individual instruction and demonstrations, and according to how they are doing the proposed exercises, making them aware of all the things they learned and what they need to correct to improve their drawings.

Finally, they are going to practice all they learned in the workshop by drawing a complete portrait using an image the instructor provides.

Class breakdown:
● Warm up exercises by sketching portraits samples.
● Fitting the main exercise portrait on the page.
● Starting with the Outline drawing of the portrait.
● Drawing the structure of the face.
● Location, proportions, symmetry.
● Drawing the features of the face.
● Shading, realistic details.
● Final touches. Gesture and expression.

About the Instructor
Pablo Contrisciani earned his Masters in Fine Arts, Painting at Facultad de Bellas Artes, National University of La Plata, in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
He has participated in several solo and group exhibitions locally, nationally and internationally. His work forms part of public and corporate collections from USA, Latin America and Europe. Pablo is an Oolite Arts alumnus (1998-2006 and 2010-2015) and works as a painting instructor since 1998.