LESSON PLANS SPRING TERM 2023 (2nd half) Lesson 4: Charcoal landscapes.

In this lesson I'm asking my students to make a charcoal study of a landscape (which can be made from a photograph or a landscape painting by a well known artist). I'll want them to negotiate with charcoal, eraser and a charcoal pencil - they can include white chalk or white pastel and white paint if they choose.

Above are some lovely examples of well-negotiated charcoal landscapes, all with very different structures and distances.

Spring Term 2nd half 2024 – Lesson 4. Charcoal landscapes – either from a photo or a well-known landscape painting.

·         Using a small piece of charcoal on its side, lightly cover your page in charcoal and smudge it with a soft cloth to make as even a coverage as you can.

·         Working from your chosen landscape image, with a good eraser, gently rub out the lighter areas of your image.

·         Continuing with soft charcoal (as opposed to compressed charcoal) look for the larger areas of tone and put them in. These can be areas which contain several different shades of tone (mid tone to dark tone) as you can add darks and rub out from these areas when necessary.

·         Once you have put the most general shapes in, then you can begin to look at each area individually and refine them, both by putting in and rubbing out. If you have a charcoal pencil (I have some I can lend) you can add this to the mix for finer details.

·         At first your drawing will be a ‘work in progress’ – rough and ready, but gradually you refine it and increasingly find the finer details.

·         Let this drawing be a negotiation!

Next lesson: Taking the landscape a step further using the medium of your choice. Bring everything you need for the medium you’d like to work with and please don’t forget your charcoal drawings as these are your working drawings.