Fast portraits

This weekend, our community celebrated the Arts & Sciences with their annual da Vinci Days festival, and I was invited, along with other local artists to draw portraits at an art booth on site. It was a great experience working with willing models, happy to sit while we sketched quickly before they lost interest! The first day I worked with pastel pencils and a set of Hi-Fi Grays. I'd practiced on a couple self portraits at home the night before, timing myself, trying to complete a finished-enough portrait within 10 minutes. Though I didn't manage to keep under my imposed time limit, I headed off Saturday morning with my supplies, and did a few portraits before leaving to catch the Kinetic Sculpture parade.

Here's part of one of the portraits I finished Saturday - a bit distorted since it was laying on the table when I thought to take a photo.


Another artist that had been working with a ball point ink pen was just racing through his portraits, so that night, I practiced again, using a papermate profile black pen, working light and loose, pressing harder with the pen to add more detail once the "bones" of the drawing were complete.

Here are 3 of the portraits I finished and gave to my willing models Sunday:




This was a terrific experience and I wished I'd taken more photos of the finished portraits and the models on Saturday. There was a sweet little girl, about 4 years old that would only sit for a portrait if she was in her Daddy's lap. I had fun drawing the both of them, she sat surprisingly still! The little boy, above - the first ink drawing, was a squirmer --- though he requested we draw him, he kept sinking into his jacket, covering his mouth, chin, while his older brother sat still as stone right next to him. I was all set to draw the older boy when this little guy showed up & personally requested I draw him! He had fun taking his turn drawing the fella next to me once I finished. It was a good place to work, under a canopy during the multiple rain showers that dampened the festival, but didn't seem to discourage people from attending.