Charcoal study

(C) 2016 Dale DiMauro

In a post from last year I mentioned purchasing jumbo charcoal pencils from Jerry's Artarama, an art supply store in North Carolina. Jerry's Artarama is the only place I am aware that sells these smearless charcoal pencils. The above drawing, was done using jet sanguine, one of the four colors I purchased. The other colors are jet black, jet white and jet sepia. I find they do not smear at all which is truly amazing. It is handy to be able to use a bound sketchbook where there is page after page pressed against each other and you do not have to worry about ruining a previous drawing. It is also a benefit to not get your clothes accidentally soiled by charcoal or its dust.

I have long admired the master artists from centuries ago such as Leonardo da Vinci or Albrecht Durer who drew with rich earth colors. This past summer when we were in New York at the Metropolitan Museum of Art touring the Sargent exhibit, there was a gallery full of lovely portrait studies drawn in chalk, charcoal and conte'. In addition to black, some of the pigments they used were sepia, sanguine, venetian red and terra cotta. 

The above drawing took about twenty minutes.