Still Lifes

When drawing still lifes with your class the first thing you want to do is set up an interesting arrangement. This means that the arrangement should be seen from multiple angles with different textures and layers. Make sure the objects overlap and the objects create a depth of field so that again the arrangement can be drawn from multiple places in your classroom. I have included an example from multiple angles.

There are some difficulties that students may come across when they are first learning to draw from life. One of those is actually drawing what the student sees and not just want they think is there. That is why this is a great lesson plan to put after the contour line drawing lesson. Another question or problem that may arise from this drawing lesson is the use of shading and so one warm up exercise that a lot of teachers use is to draw a shading scale for your graphite pencils to experiment with the material and to really get a handle on how to use a full variation of shades. Here is an example of the shading scale.

For first time still life drawers I would probably not start with a full scale project but work on using the techniques from the contour line project and apply them to the still life lesson. You can do this by doing a contour line still life lesson plan that will utilize both project skills and will not emphasize on shading. Then when students feel comfortable with drawing from life they can add in shading from the still life lesson plan.

There is always going to be frustration when drawing from life with kids off this age range, just because students often will want to get things “right” making sure that every student feels accomplished is going to be important especially on these projects.

(side note this last picture is a still life in charcoal)