The first class I taught at the 2012 NQA (National Quilting Association) show was Drawn and Painted portraits. This class is usually a challenge to teach. When I asked at the beginning of class, out of 22 students, I think only one person said they had done a portrait before. Added to that challenge, I usually teach this as a full-day workshop, so I was working hard to squeeze the most important things in our limited time without making people feel overly rushed. I was so thankful sweet hubby was there to help!
I was thrilled with everyone’s results. We were focusing on learning to shade a face so it looks more three-dimensional. I was also encouraging people to try mediums they had never used before.
For our first portrait, we used a tracing technique combined with a dry medium like colored pencils or crayons. I encourage people to use a non-skin color to work with so they can just concentrate on shading and not worry about trying to match skin tones.
During the second part of the morning we switched gears and pulled out our paints, inks, and watercolor pencils. These mediums are always extra challenging because they don’t stay where you put them, so students have to learn how to control them. Many of these quilters were painting for the first time, and they certainly did a great job with a difficult medium and the short amount of time we had.
In the afternoon, I taught my Perspective for Quilters workshop. Again, this topic is so big, the most I could do was give an introduction. I was so busy trying to squeeze everything in, I completely forgot to take pictures!
More tomorrow.
Comments
6 responses to “2012 NQA – Drawn and Painted Portraits class”
ALL the pictures are fabulous – You are an amazing teacher with very skilled students!!
The class portraits all look fantastic. I wish I could have attended. Hopefully I will have an opportunity to attend one or more of your workshops in the future.
Thank you for sharing!
Thank you, Maria! The workshop was wonderful and I hope to explore what you taught us in class. I had a great time!
Keep up the amazing work you do!
I enjoyed all of the classes I took . Of this class I enjoyed the crayons shading more than the painting . I was wondering if I copied the back of the picture could I practice the fused technique? Thanks again .
I’m glad you enjoyed it! I did use similar techniques to prepare the photo for both processes, so it’s worth a try 🙂 Let me know how it goes!
Fabulous class. Had a great time. We accomplished so much in so little time. Can you imagine if we would have had a full day. Looking forward to taking another class from you in the near future. You are an amazing teacher.