Chapter - 19
Painting The Child [2nd Stage Of Drawing]

Proceeding In an orderly way with the construction of the head, begin at the part of the hair and, with your brush and the same paint mixture as before (cerulean blue-cadmium red light), strike the hairline over the forehead, down across the temples and over the ears, down around the cheek and jaws. Study these lines carefully as they give the over-all shape of the face. Next, starting again at the top of the head, draw any remaining outside lines of the hair.

While we have said "study these lines carefully," complete exactness is not required at this stage, particularly with a line like this one bounding the outside limits of the hair; you can correct this as you paint the background. Later, however, these hairlines should be given as much study as the eyes, mouth, etc.

Never make these early construction lines fine and wiry; it is a common mistake of the beginner to do so. Study the lines in our illustrations and see how wide they are, even in these small reproductions. Obviously they were much broader in the original paintings.

Plate 23 makes clear the general effect that a drawing should have at this stage.

PLATE 24

painting tip

The Completed Drawing

This brings the drawing to completion as the foundation for the later painting. Sketchy as this is, the likeness begins to unfold.

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