A Family at Terracina
Corot, A Family at Terracina, 1871. Transfer lithograph printed in brown on cream China paper laid down on white wove paper.
Pins mark where to look before you draw.
The Art Institute of Chicago · William McCallin McKee Memorial Endowment
A Family at Terracina
Figures, a cliff, and an Italian memory in crayon
1871: a family group in the foreground of a coastal scene remembered from the Italian years (Terracina is on the road from Rome to Naples), a great cliff or tree mass behind. Figures as a cluster of dark notes against a halftone ground, with the big mass set softly behind. A composition lesson about grouping.
- Difficulty
- Time
- about 2 h
- You draw with
- 4B and 6B graphite on their sides, charcoal pencil
Why this one
- A figure group handled as one dark cluster, not three people.
- The big background mass is soft-edged so the figures stay in front.
From your kit
The whole kit →- 1Grafwood 4B, 6B 4B, 6B for the darks, on their sides for mass. Long points from the Blackwing on everything up to B.
- 2Willow charcoal, or until it arrives Pitt Matt 12B and 14B on their sides the matt grades are the closest graphite gets to willow. Slip sheet under the hand.
- 3Pitt Matt 14B, knife-sharpened stands in for the charcoal pencil: trunk, branch zig-zag, the one accent.
- 4Kneaded eraser (warm it) and the clean Mono Zero lift the lights out of the mass; the Mono Zero for sky holes and lit edges.
- 5Alpha sketchbook 9 x 6 draw at the book's size and keep the proportions; date the page.
In general, this study asks for
- Drawing pad, medium tooth
- 2B, 4B, 6B with long points
- Kneaded eraser
- Precision eraser
- Slip sheet
Watch first
All videos →The drawing stage only: litho crayon on stone behaves like charcoal on toothed paper. That is why the Corot lithographs look like his fusains.
YouTube
The plan
3 stages · ~95 min- 1
Group the group
10 minThumbnail the figures as one dark shape. That shape is what you will draw.
Checklist0 / 1 - 2
Back to front
70 minThe big mass first, soft, with the side of the pencil. Ground. Then the figure cluster as one dark shape, then the few marks that separate them.
Checklist0 / 2 - 3
Compare
15 minCompare, box.
Checklist0 / 1
What it should look like
- A dark family-shaped cluster in front of a soft cliff.
Where it goes wrong
- Three separate figures. Drawn one at a time. Draw the silhouette of the group first.
Log this session
Start the clock when you pick up the pencil. Stop it when you put it down. Log it. Every session counts toward the box.
Status
How did it go?
Before this, ideally
