Drawn to Faces

Why am I so drawn to drawing faces?? (please excuse the pun!)

This is a question I ask myself quite often, especially when I realise that I have a collection of over 100 faces drawn in the last 18 months and not much else!!

To me, every face tells a story. A story of a life lived and of being lived. And this makes me curious to discover what lies beneath the ‘masks’ that we all put on now an again. A portrait, either drawn or photographed captures a moment in time, an emotion conveyed and gives a glimpse of the heart.

While I love drawing the face, I always find myself fixed on the eyes of each face. They draw me in to the deeper parts of each heart, to what’s within – a life mirrored with all its joys and heartaches. And I believe that that is where the unique ‘song’ of each person dwells.

“Every painting has a bit of me in it.”

 

Maria Hegedus

It’s quite amazing to realise that perhaps each face carries a bit of me within it, which probably explains why friends often say “I feel like I know her” when they look at one of my portraits!

I’m currently doing a new course “The Many Faces of Charcoal” by the wonderful artist Juna Biagioni to learn some new techniques in drawing with charcoal. If you ever get the opportunity to do one of her courses, you won’t be disappointed! She is an amazing and talented teacher.

The two faces above are from my first week of the course using water on some of the underlay of the drawing which fixes the charcoal to the surface. So much fun!