Realistic Self Portrait

Artist Statement:

In this project, we had to make a self-portrait using charcoal and ink only. Not only did we have to make a self-portrait, but we also had to make it a realistic self-portrait. This meant we had to use all of the new drawing tools from past units in this unit. For example, I used a little bit of perspective to make it look more realistic or using the value of different materials. The value scale that we made in this project was really helpful because it helped us get a feel of how we should use the materials before we put it all on paper. This project was tougher for me because I’m not as good at making things look realistic. It’s hard for me to use details to make

In this project, we were supposed to use 2 major materials. These were ink and charcoal were used in many different ways and forms to get the right shades and values for the portrait. We used water to lighten the color of ink into a lighter gray if we wanted to make something lighter than pitch black. For charcoal, we had a bunch of thicknesses and we also had white charcoal to make black charcoal lighter or to add highlights to certain spots. For erasing charcoal we don’t use a normal eraser. Instead, we use a black eraser to make sure we get rid of all those spots of charcoal that we don’t want. Ink is a lot like using watercolor paint except that the color is a lot more pigmented.

For this art project, we used the gridding process. We gridded our photo and portrait and went square by square until we had drawn our entire photo. This is an effective way to draw because it helps you see all the little details and important parts of the photo that you might have missed if you weren’t looking at each individual square. When seeing all of the little squares make one big shape you were able to see the bigger details. It was really cool to see the picture evolve after drawing it. My next steps would be to look even closer and stop worrying about how strange it looks. I focus so much on what it looks like after 5 squares and I need to trust the process to see what it looks like after all the squares.