Starting from reference photos from you immediate enironment we will branch out in interesting and playful ways.

This course is ideal for anyone looking to loosen up their technique and explore a middle space between abstraction and representation through various drawing exercises and techniques.

Course Content

This course provides a structure for you to build regular drawing in dry and wet mediums into your schedule over a number of weeks.

Each week will introduce a new medium and drawing exercises that will help you to continuously evolve a set of compositions into a more abstract and personal visual language.

Enjoy this course on its own, or use it as the foundation for an upcoming course on abstract painting by Julie.

  • Through varied drawing exercises create work quickly and generate ideas for finished paintings

  • Through a process-driven approach, find new possibilities for your own art to become more unique to you

  • Let go of preconceived ideas of the end result to have fun and achieve unexpected and exciting results

This course has been designed to give a structure to help you evolve as an artist, with opportunities to receive regular personalised feedback from Julie.

Introduction

  • Credits

  • Introducing the course concept

  • Introduction to course materials

  • Materials List

  • Your goals for this course

Week 1 - Pencil

  • Week 1 outline

  • Photo selection

  • Pencil exercises

  • Week 1 challenge

Week 2 - Charcoal

  • Week 2 outline

  • Warm up exercises

  • Drawing demo

  • Week 2 challenge

Week 3 - Ink

  • Week 3 outline

  • Warm up exercises

  • Drawing Demo

  • Week 3 Challenge

Week 4- Mixed Media Pt.1

  • Week 4 outline

  • Warm up exercises

  • Drawing demo

  • Week 4 Challenge

Week 5 - Mixed Media Pt.2

  • Week 5 outline

  • Warm up exercise

  • Large scale demo pt. 1

  • Large scale demo pt. 2

  • Week 5 Challenge

Book a call with me!

  • Book a call with me!

  • Book a call with me - set session goals

  • Confirmation Page

More about this course

We have tried to answer some common questions about this couse to help you understand how it can help your own drawing.

  • What media will be used throughout this course?

    The focus of this course is on drawing. For this we will use not just traditional dry drawing media of graphite pencils and charcoal, we will also use water soluble ink with brushes. We will also explore how to mix these media together and apply marks using non-tranditional methods.

  • Is this course only for people who want to paint abstract or non-representational art?

    While this course will link to another course on abstract painting, this is not just for artists who want to paint abstract art. This course will benefit you if you are looking to:

    - Make a lot of work quickly
    - Loosen up your drawing technique
    - Find your own personal style of mark making
    - Explore how to organise space and shapes within your drawings
    - Achieve unexpected and exciting results
    - Have more fun making art :-)

  • Is this course suitable for beginners?

    This course will benefit artists of all levels who are looking to have fun with drawing and painting. This is not an 'academic' course, making it very accessible to beginners. If you are a beginner you will benefit from some good practices that will help you develop a style that is fluid and based on the process of drawing and painting itself.

    If you are more experienced, this will benefit you in other ways, allowing you to 'let go' of certain expectations you may have about an end result. By following this course you will hopefully surprise yourself countless times with 'happy accidents' that you can then develop and work over with intention and purpose.

  • When does the course start and stop?

    There is no schedule for this course. You can start and stop any time you want. We would recommend however that you try to maintain continuity and avoid breaks between work of more than 1 or 2 weeks if possible. Since you can take this course at your own pace, you will not be part of a group of students that meet together. Therefore it is important that you are motivated to follow the course yourself.

  • The course is broken down into a weekly lessons. Do I need to complete each lesson in one week?

    The weekly lessons are there to suggest a schedule for you to work within. You can of course take longer than one week to complete a lesson. However we would recommend setting a goal to complete a lesson within a week if possible. If you are finding that you are stuck on a lesson, it may benefit you to stick with it for longer. Don't be afraid to throw away results you are unhappy with and try again.

  • Can I get feedback on my work from Julie?

    Each week presents an opportunity to upload your work for feedback from Julie. Take advantage of this and don't be shy to upload work that you are unhappy with. All student uploads are confidential and will not be seen by other students. Julie will give you objective feedback and this could very well help you make the breakthrough you need.

    Try not to have a fixed idea about how you expect a drawing to come out. This course is very much process driven. Try to embrace and not stand in the way of unexpected results. These can spark your imagination to take the work further than you might have thought possible.

  • This course is based on photo references, however I prefer to work from life. Will this course benefit me?

    This course can certainly benefit artists who like to work from life, including still life or plein air artists. Photos in this course are just vehicles for you to focus on freeing up your drawing and painting techniques and take your work into a more personal space of mark making and composition. All of the benefits you will get from this process and many of the techniques can easily transfer back to your work from life.