Marc's Mares

I have recently redone this project to reflect a Wizard of Oz connection. What could that possibly be you may ask? Why it was "a horse of a different color" of course!

I also repost this today to ask for some help. If you like drawing horses, I am looking for submissions for a horse themed art show to benefit my local equine therapy group, Healing Horses. It is their mission to better the lives of all children, especially those with disabilities and processing disorders like Autism and Asperger's Syndrome through interaction with horses. The show will run from October 1st through 31st, so I will need your submissions no later that September 17th. You can email them to msjuliesartclass@aol.com or if you would like more information.
Be sure to include your first name, age, and email address. If you'd like you can include a picture of yourself, but that is not necessary. Prints will be made, framed, hung, and offered for purchase. All the proceeds go to Healing Horses. Those chosen for the show will receive a certificate of participation and a photo of the horses used for this therapy.

To learn more try these books...

Franz Marc was a German painter famous for his brightly painted animals that were slightly cubist in nature. To learn more about him you can visit my post about him at my other site Artist of the Week for Kids. For now, we will just delve right into a project. May was horse month in my art room(unfortunately so was the worst morning sickness I have had to date) so though I wasn't posting here, I was working on projects! Today you will see the first of these.

To begin you will need

Pencil
Paper
sharpie marker- black
oil pastels
Q-tips.

The drawing instructions look like this...

At this point you will want to outline the horse in black sharpie.

Then decide whether to use rectangles, circles or triangles
and then draw them in pencil over the outlined horse.
Be sure to overlap often and to make some shapes
smaller and other larger.

Here is what rectangles might look like.

Now you will want to use the oil pastels to outline all the lines. Be sure to use bright, bold colors like Marc did. He was not aiming for realistic colors but ones that would make a dramatic impact.

Keep all the lines inside the horse's head the same color, use a different color for the mane, and a third color to outline all the lines of the background.

Once that is done, use a Q-tip to blend the edges inside each shape.

Here are some student examples.

Read more...

Welcome to Horse Month!

May is Horse Month at Miss Julie's Art School
and to kick things off, we started off with
a horse sketch done in the style of Leonardo daVinci.

What you will need:

Paper
pencil
brown washable marker
q-tip
water

1. We started out using a large oval, a small oval and a medium circle to begin.
We drew in pencil first.

2.I did not use a circle and tube method for the legs as most drawing lesson books would have
just because the original sketch seemed very loose and gesture like, it it also not completely finished as the hoof comes off the page and we don't really see the 4th leg.

3.We did add a mane and tail.

4. Once you are satisfied with your drawing, go over all the lines you are keeping with the brown marker. Then you can erase all the guidelines that won't be part of the finished drawing.

5. Lastly go over all the marker lines with a wet q-tip.
The water based marker will smear and create a "sepia" effect.
There will be enough "paint" to create shadowing
effects as well or even color the entire horse.
Take note of the areas on the horse that are more rounded
or very muscular as those shaped create shadows.

Stay tuned all month as we explore many ways many different artists have portrayed horses!

Read more...