Intro to Portrait Drawing — High Low Art Space

Bridging the Gap: Portrait Drawing and Painting Workshop

5 day Workshop

March 3 - March 7 2025

10:00 am - 5:00 PM

WITH Iliya mirochnik

all levels welcome

PRICE - $495

workshop summary

This 5-day workshop dives into portraiture, offering participants a comprehensive approach to drawing and painting techniques. Split equally between drawing and painting, this class will reveal how each discipline informs the other, allowing students to transition from drawing to painting as two stages of a unified process. Through exercises and instructor demonstrations, participants will learn to block out forms abstractly before moving into a more detailed, constructive analysis. The goal is to strengthen understanding of how drawing and painting can function as two sides of the same coin. Students of figurative art often encounter challenges in crossing the drawing-painting gap and this workshop aims to address them. The skills developed in this workshop are also adaptable to various genres, such as still life, landscape, and multi-figurative composition.

Class Description

Over five days, students will explore portraiture through a structured yet flexible approach, starting with drawing in soft media and moving to oil painting. During the first 2.5 days, the workshop will focus on drawing, using Conte, pastel, and charcoal on paper. Emphasis will be placed on quickly blocking out abstract shapes and forms and developing the details through constructive anatomical analysis, helping participants achieve a foundational understanding that will directly support their painting practice.

The second half of the workshop will then shift to painting in oils, translating the drawing skills into working with color. Participants will use the same abstract blocking approach and refine the details through constructive analysis of the anatomy of the human head. We’ll explore palette setup, color, carving with paint, transparent modeling, and more.

Iliya will demonstrate the drawing and painting approaches to help illustrate the principles in the workshop.

By the end of the workshop, participants will be able to see both drawing and painting as complementary skills that support each other in creating dynamic, realistic, structurally sound portraits.

MATERIALS

The exact brands are up to you, but I included some specific products for easy access and viewing:

Drawing Supplies

Soft media: conte, pastel, charcoal
Paper (stretched or not) in sizes: (Strathmore 400)

16 x 20 inches (head only)
18 x 24 inches (head and shoulders)
Larger, if desired

Painting Supplies

Surface options: canvas, canvas paper, or bristol paper in recommended sizes (same as drawing)
Palette (with or without a palette box)
Linseed oil and/or Gamsol (or preferred medium)
Brushes (mainly rounds and filberts)

Suggested Paint Palette

Titanium White, Zinc White
Cadmium Yellow Medium, Cadmium Red Light
Cobalt Blue, Ultramarine
Alizarin Crimson, Viridian
Burnt Umber, Ivory Black

Participants are encouraged to bring their preferred materials within these recommendations but can work within their usual palette.

Schedule

10:00 am - 1:00 pm 1st Session

1:00 pm - 2:00 pm lunch break

2:00 pm - 5:00 pm 2nd session

REFUNDS

Please contact us at least 14 days before the workshop for a full refund. From then until 7 days before the start date refunds are 50%. Due to our limited workshop sizes we cannot process refunds within a week of the workshop starting