For any art student, learning how to draw a portrait is an important rite of passage. However, it is something that can feel complex and intimidating.  With that in mind, this post is devoted to all of the art students out there who want to learn how to master portrait-drawing at home.  Below, you’ll find a list of 15 online art classes that teach students how to draw portraits via step-by-step tutorials.  Links are given to each course in the description (all of them are free to Sparketh members.) There are many different styles of portraits represented in the courses here, as well as versatile artistic techniques that can help you on your portrait-drawing journey. We hope you’ll explore them and find something that fits your needs, helps you learn, and gives you hours of artistic inspiration and fun!

Pictured:  Dwayne Walker, Sparketh CEO/ one of Sparketh’s art instructors

1. Realism Portrait Online Art Course

Realism is (appropriately enough) a realistic style of drawing or painting that originated in France in the mid 1800s. A portrait done in the style of realism attempts to capture all details of the person being drawn as accurately as possible–like a photograph. This advanced, step-by-step Realism Portrait Tutorial shows students how to draw an accurate portrait in this style, sharing tips and tricks every step of the way.

2. Manga Portrait Online Art Course

Manga is a Japanese style of illustration that has become increasingly popular over the last several years. It’s a very fun and exaggerated  art style, which makes it really great for creative kids and teens to play with.  This Manga Portrait Tutorial will help Manga fans create an original character in this style!

3. Cubism Portrait Online Art Course

If you or your child/teen is looking for a unique or alternative take on drawing portraits, try exploring portraits in the art style of Cubism! The Cubism movement in art originated in the early 19th century and is most commonly associated with Picasso. This art form doesn’t just look groovy, though. It’s also great practice in mapping out shapes and showing the subject from multiple perspectives at once!  Use this online art course to draw a Cubism portrait–you’ll end up with a really cool drawing and some valuable artistic skills in your toolbox, too.

4. Pop Art Portrait Online Art Course

Pop art uses bright colors, bold lines and shapes, and popular cultural influences to form an artistic style that truly (*incoming pun*) pops. Kids and teens can learn a little bit about the Pop Art Movement and have a blast creating their own pop art style portrait with this Pop Art Portrait Online Art Course.

5. Surrealism Portraits

This Surrealism Portrait Course for advanced students will show students how to take a psychological, dream-like approach to the portraits they draw.  This online art course will help students think differently about how they approach portraits, and shares useful tips for blending realism and surrealism to create a mind-bending portrait drawing.

6. Gesture Drawing

Gesture drawing is all about keeping the artwork quick, loose, and focused on movement. Therefore, practicing gesture drawing can  help artists become quicker and more decisive as they sketch lines that reflect the subject’s basic shapes and lines. (These are all important skills for any artist who draws portraits, especially when drawing them from life!) This Gesture Drawing Course will help strengthen your child or teen’s art toolbox and portrait skills.

7. Harlem Renaissance Portrait

With this Harlem Renaissance Portrait, artists learn how to recognize and recreate certain elements from this dynamic artistic movement! Students will learn how to create an energetic, colorful portrait that makes a statement by intentionally emphasizing certain elements and features (and playing down others).

8. Facial Proportions

New to drawing portraits, or need a refresher? This online Facial Proportions Art Class for beginners teaches students how to sketch out basic facial proportions. This one is the perfect course to start with before exploring some of the different styles of art portraits mentioned here! Once you have a good understanding of facial proportions, you can apply that knowledge to any art style you like!

9. Hair Textures

Sometimes, young artists (and older ones, too) get in a “hair rut” in their drawings of people and start drawing everyone with the same type of hair. This fun, online Hair Texture Tutorial explores several different types of hair textures and will help students get comfortable with drawing each one. This is definitely a great skill for any artist to have a handle on.

10. Hands

Drawing hands doesn’t come naturally to many artists. However, including a subject’s hands in his or her portrait can make the portrait more interesting, expressive, and complex (in a good way!) This course, which was originally created for Mother’s Day, shows art students how to sketch out basic shapes for the hands before filling in details.

11.  Basic Colored Pencil Techniques

Colored pencils can be a versatile, convenient  and affordable art medium for kids and teens. They can be very useful in drawing portraits! You can actually do more with these tools than a lot of new artists realize. This Basic Colored Pencil Techniques Course covers some tips and tricks that will help you elevate your colored pencil game. Apply these tips to drawing portraits—or anything you like!

12. Basic Watercolor Techniques

This Basic Watercolor Online Art Course is perfect for kids and teens to the unique medium of watercolor painting! Watercolor painting is very different from other types of painting, so it can be a little confusing to know how to get started without a little bit of guidance. Students can use the foundational techniques in this online art course and apply them to watercolor paintings of all types (including, of course, portraits!)

P.S. One really cool method for watercolor portraits is to draw the portrait in a non-bleeding pen (using your preferred art style) and then paint over the more detailed lines with loose, wet-on-wet watercolor!

13. Fauvism Portrait

The art style of Fauvism is all about bright, contrasting colors and striking visuals, which can result in fun and exciting portraits! This online Fauvism Portrait course will show students how to apply some of the techniques of Fauvism as they follow the steps in the tutorial to create a vividly colorful portrait.

14. Impressionism Portrait

As the name indicates, the art movement of Impressionism focused on the impression of a subject or scene. Impressionistic art pays attention to things like light, color, movement, and feeling. Looking at an impressionistic portrait should therefore give a true impression of the living subject. This online art course will show students the basics that are needed to complete a portrait in the style of Impressionism.

15. I See You Challenge

This open-ended challenge has limitless possibilities. It challenges students to think closely about the details when drawing a subject’s eyes. How will the light be reflected in the shape of the eye? What “Easter eggs,” could you add into the eyes’ reflections to say something interesting or insightful about the person you are drawing? This detail-oriented challenge is perfect for students who are trying to think of ways to make their portraits stand out.

We hope that these courses make it easy for your (or your art student) to gain confidence, boost skills and have fun while drawing many different types of portraits! All of these courses are included in the Sparketh membership, but don’t forget to upload your finished products after completing each course! We love to see what you’ve been up to over in the gallery. We also have a special art track for portraits that contains most of these art courses. Joining this track can make it easy for you to keep up with which portrait courses you’ve tried, and what you’d like to try next!

Do you love drawing portraits? Which of these courses will you try first?

The post Want to Draw Better Portraits? These 15 Online Art Classes Will Help! appeared first on Sparketh.

Today, we’re debating whether AI art is a tool or a threat, learning a viral painting trend that anyone can do at home, and talking about a famous portrait (which has been STOLEN.)

Creative Debate: Will AI Replace Artists or Give Them New Tools?

Humankind has considered a lot of possibilities when it comes to Artificial Intelligence. Will AI develop its own unique consciousness? Help us reach new heights? Take over the world? Create a simulation that we will all live in while they use us up like batteries??? (Hope not).

But there’s a new – very current – question to consider when it comes to AI and creativity:

Will AI one day replace artists, or – at minimum- change the practice and value of art as we know it? 

This question springs from the creation of new AI art tools like Midjourney and Dall-E 2.

What they are:

These are AI tools that can actually create unique art based on selected parameters and specifications. They can create works that features any subjects you chose, in any setting, doing anything! These tools can even implement a famous artist’s style into the original creation by accessing and retaining information about color and style from the internet.

It’s amazing technology, but it also brings up some serious debates in the art world:

The issues:

1. Can we call such creations true art?
2. If we can, what are the implications for the future of art…and artists?

Perspective #1: Tools are simply tools.

No matter the tools that we may use to express our creativity, we humans have always seen ourselves as the creative masterminds behind creative endeavors (such as art). And many people see AI art tools as just that – tools: ones that can and will take our abilities to new, unimagined levels of awesome.

Perspective #2: AI art crosses an important line.

Because the dividing line between what tools and people can do has long been rooted in humanity’s creativity, these AI tools can be seen as crossing that line.  Many are concerned that, in this case, the AI becomes the real artist and makes most of the creative choices. If so, does this begin to de-value artists and change the way we view the worth of art?

What do you think, readers? Is AI art simply another tool in the artist’s toolbelt? Or does this new AI flip the switch: becoming the real artist while the person typing commands acts more like the machine? 

The below video does an excellent job investigating how this technology works and exploring some of these questions. I really appreciated that an artist and non-artist both gave Dall-E2 a try and compared their results to tackle these issues.

Check it out and decide where you stand in the great AI art debate!

One thing is for sure, we live in a quickly advancing digital age that has and continues to shape our world. The art world is – and will continue-to adapt along with it.

Trend to Try at Home: Acrylic Paint + Q-Tips

Now for something a little lighter and unobjectively hands-on…Q-Tip painting!

Most of us have a box of Q-Tips somewhere at home. After all, they are pretty much good for everything! ( And even though the box says not to stick them in your ears – admit it- you totally have.) This week, let’s add to the list of amazing things Q-Tips can do: help you paint beautiful trees.

In this week’s viral YouTube Short, an artist shows how you can use Q-Tips + acrylic paint to beautiful build and layer colors for leaves. It’s an effortless way to level up your tree painting skills.

Want to try painting some vibrant fall trees instead? To celebrate the first day of fall (September 22) one of the artists on the Sparketh team also created the below video this week. This one is a longer, more step-by-step take on the Q-Tip, tree-painting process. It does a great job of showing how you can build color from dark to light with acrylic paint to create an easy autumn painting!

Challenge: Check out these videos and try your own Q-Tip painted trees at home this week!

Art News: Famous Portrait Stolen! Owners didn’t notice.

Winston Churchill’s iconic portrait has been stolen, and he doesn’t look too pleased about it! Roaring Lion, the famous photograph by Yousuf Karsh, is one of the the most well-known and widely reproduced portraits in the world. Winston’s hard stare (which was a result of the photographer taking away his ever-present cigar), has become the image with which we identify the no-nonsense historic figure and world leader.

The Roaring Lion, Winston Churchill Photo by Yousuf Karsh, bromide print, 1941.

The original photograph has lived at the Fairmont Chateau Laurier in Ottowa, Canada for the past several decades. The hotel was a place of special significance to the artist, who gifted the establishment with a large collection of works.

Last month, however, an employee of the hotel noticed that something about it seemed…off. The frame that held Roaring Lion looked different than the other hotel frames. An examination of the signature determined that the portrait at the hotel was not the original. At some point, the original Roaring Lion was swapped for one of its many reproductions!

By asking for photographs from over the last several months from guests and employees, investigations have determined that the original was actually swapped out approximately 8 months ago (8 months!) It is thought to be an inside job, and police are investigating it further.

My thoughts: whoever stole this portrait will have to face their guilt while meeting Winston’s furious gaze. It’s all very Portrait of Dorian Gray.

Viral: Is Art School Overpriced?

“Is art school overpriced?”

This week’s viral TikTok video asks the question, and then blasts us with mind-blowing art skills. A

Art school was not what I was thinking about while watching this artist’s stunning black and white creation. Instead, I was wondering how someone’s brain and hands can work like that! But if art school could teach can help brains and hands do that, it’s pretty priceless. And that’s the point of the question, right?

In this blogger’s opinion, honing creative skills is always worth an investment, because creativity is one of the best things about being alive! What do you think, readers?

@psychegod

Is art school overpriced? Probably #fyp #art #artist #artschool #foryou #usc

♬ Notion – The Rare Occasions

On that note, I’m wishing you all a very happy and creative week! Catch you next week for more creativity resources and art news!

The post The AI Art Debate, Painting with Q-Tips, and Angry Winston Churchill appeared first on Sparketh.