I’ve been taking the “Collected Stories” class by Renee Mueller, so I’ve been doing a lot of charcoal drawings.
Charcoal drawings are a bit intimidating for me. I’m not sure why since it’s how I started as an artist when I was a young kid and I always make my way through a drawing, but there’s something about it that always makes me a bit anxious at first.
My beautiful daughter has become my muse for this class, which I love because I get to draw her over and over again.
Renee is such a wonderful teacher and encourages her students to explore ways to incorporate the things she’s teaching with our own style, so I took one of the drawings of my daughter and uploaded it into Adobe Fresco where I added digital elements. First I started by adding tons of live oil brush strokes on different layers and then changed the layer modes. (I teach all how to do this in my class Mixed Media Graphic Art).
Then I used a smudge brush to smooth out the charcoal lines in her face and then with a large brush and broad strokes I blended out the edges so they merged into the oil brush strokes I had added.
I added a couple layers of ephemera and then some handwritten text and it turned out better than I could have planned.
Playing with different elements and techniques, mixing things you don’t normally and trying techniques outside your comfort zone is so important to our growth as artists.
Heidi Cogdill 