Life Drawing

Life Drawing, also known as figure drawing, is the practice of drawing the human figure, traditionally nude, from direct observation of a live model.

Essential materials include a variety of drawing tools such as charcoal sticks or pencils, Conté crayons, pastels, erasers and blending tools. My figure drawings are mainly created with Conté sanguine or graphite pencils, and some in charcoal.

What is Conté Sanguine?

Sanguine (from the French sanguine, in English red chalk) is a drawing material widely used since the Renaissance for figure studies and portraits. It comes in sticks or pencils and produces a warm reddish-brown stroke, with tones ranging from orange-tinged reds to deeper browns. The name comes from the Latin sanguis (“blood”), as its colour recalls dried blood or oxidised iron.

Traditionally, sanguine was obtained from natural stone rich in iron oxide (hematite), which was cut and polished into sticks, or ground into powder and then pressed.

Later, as in the case of Conté pencils (named after the French manufacturer Nicolas-Jacques Conté in the 18th century), the material was mixed with clay and binders and fired to achieve greater consistency and hardness, methods that are still applied in the commercial sticks we use today.

Figure studies in Conté sanguine

Approximate size A4.

Available mounted to fit a 40 × 30 cm frame, or fully framed.