I have been doing this for more than two years at my local library here in teeny-tiny Skiatook, OK. I go Tuesday and Thursday afternoons and do free sketches of anyone who will be by "victim." Usually kids. I try to spin out simple pencil sketches in five miinutes, or thereabouts.
It's challenging and fun, and definitely helps the old "eye/hand" duo, and it definitely helped my painting.
I invite mothers (especially mothers) to stand behind and watch it all go together. Whether it's good, or not so good, they ooh and aah, of course because they can't do it.
One day, a little girl stood beside my watching me sketch a teen boy. Quietly, she leaned forward and said softly, "That doesn't look like him."
I asked her if I had ever drawn her.
"Yes," she replied.
"Was it any good?" I asked.
"Oh yes," she replied, "you're a very great artist, you know."
I've always wondered how I could be great enough to sketch her flawlessly and not the teen boy.
But it's always fun, and a great source of free models. It also lets me pick the good heads for later development in oil.
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