Art Unboxed Minimalist Portraits
This week I started something by accident. Last night, while not feeling well, I saw a number of famous birthdays on July 21. I enjoy drawing or painting portraits of people and sharing.
I didn’t feel like even sketching with my fountain pen so I grabbed my phone and began some digital minimalist portraits.
The challenge of a minimalist portrait is that the few number of lines have to carry more weight. Some faces are easier, others are quite hard. It also helps if the person your drawing has a unique shape to their head. The famous painter John Singer Sargent is reported to have said that if you can get the shape of the skull right, the likeness will be easier. I’ve found that to be true.
Abraham Lincoln for example has a unique shape to his head. Someone like Washington has a unique shape because of both his nose and hair. Many people have a particular shape to their nose or mouth. The danger with this is focusing solely on one distinguishing characteristic. The best way I know to say this is that if you get Jimmy Durante’s nose right but his mouth wrong, it’s not Durante.
The likeness doesn’t have to be perfect, but it should be a likeness. It needs to look like the person it’s a portrait of. Out of each of the portraits, the easiest two for me were Tony Bennett who passed today, and Don Knotts. The hardest was Robin Williams. I think part of the reason for both is the fact that I had previously successfully painted both Tony Bennett and Don Knotts, but had always struggled with Robin Williams.
It took four attempts to get Robin Williams to where it had a likeness. Though his nose was distinctive, he had a fairly regularly shaped face. It’s why artists enjoy painting certain portraits I believe, there’s more to grab hold of with say a Durante than a Williams.
I would encourage you to try a minimalist portrait of a famous face or two. It’s great practice in both draftsmanship, and in conveying a likeness. Some will turn out like a portrait, some will turn out as a caricature, which is its own art form. Some won’t turn out, but they’re not a waste of effort. Every wrong portrait teaches you a little about drawing a better one.
