An Honest Evaluation

I began learning to draw in June, 2015. That’s almost ten years ago! Of course, it hasn’t been a consistent, on-going process. I developed a few basic drawing skills and then went on to explore different media, different genres, and to finally “find myself” as a landscape artist working primarily in oil. For someone who once couldn’t draw a straight line, I’ve come a long way, even winning multiple awards for my landscape oils.

So, I should be content with that, right? Obviously I learned to draw well enough to become a reasonably good landscape artist — and reasonably good at creating a variety of other things, as well.

For the most part, I have been content with my drawing and painting skills, or, at least, I was. While I recognized that there were some things I’d simply never be good at — perspective, architectural drawing, animals, portraiture, detailed botanical drawing, watercolor — that was fine. After trying a bit of everything I realized that “an artist” doesn’t have to be good in every area or proficient with every medium. It’s part of what makes art such an interesting adventure.

But then I took a break. A long break. I’d grown a bit frustrated, had tried to push myself a bit too much, and I needed to step away from the studio for a while. I never intended to be gone for two years, but that’s about how long my break was. Oh, I came to the studio now and then and played a little, but in so many ways, my heart wasn’t in it. I was physically present but not fully here, if you know what I mean.

Now, it’s 2025, almost 10 years from the time I first decided to learn to draw. I’m back in the studio, and I’m enjoying my time here. I have more realistic expectations for myself, I think, and I definitely have a much greater understanding of who I am as an artist — and who I want to be.

I am first and foremost a landscape artist. I love Mother Earth. While it’s fun to play around with still life drawings, figure drawing, and other genres, it’s nature in all its glory that calls to me. Rivers, trees, skies and clouds, lakes, leaves, the changing of the seasons… and all the wondrous moods and emotions that the land can evoke. This is what I love as an artist.

I plan to return to my easel and oil paints very soon, and I will be painting landscapes. I also plan to do landscapes with oil pastels — another medium I enjoy. And then, there’s graphite. Yes, I can make “quick sketches” of landscapes, sufficient for planning and blocking-out landscape paintings. But truly, I want to do more. I want to take my “basic pencil skills” and improve them so that I can create landscape drawings as well as paintings.

I’ve outlined a good “study program” for myself to improve my landscape drawing and painting, and that includes going through and re-reading William F. Powell’s book on landscape drawing.

This edition was published in 2003. There is a newer edition published in 2020.

I don’t have the newer edition, so I can’t say if there are any significant differences between the two.

I’ve read through this book before. I’ve followed along with the suggested drawing exercises, and I’ve copied various illustrations. It was in 2020, almost 5 years ago, that I seriously worked through this graphite landscape drawing book. I can’t say that I achieved as much success as I’d hoped, but I do feel that I learned a lot from it. I was, in fact, rather proud of some of the drawings I made.

Today, I repeated a little drawing that I’d first done in 2020. It’s a simple illustration Powell uses, and I happily drew it five years ago. I was pleased with it.

I liked the drawing because it was quite obviously recognizable for what it was supposed to be. I felt I’d done an “adequate” job of shading.

For reference, here are the illustrations from Powell’s book, showing the process of shading, blending, and refining.

Obviously my drawing — above — wasn’t quite as “finished”, but I was still happy with it. And, for what it’s worth, as I look at Powell’s illustrations above, in some ways, I prefer the first — on the left — that hasn’t been quite so “finished”. What do you think?

This morning, I drew this again, and it’s time now for an honest evaluation. Are my drawing skills better now than they were 5 years ago? Are they worse? Is there no real difference between the two drawings?

Again, my drawing doesn’t have the “finished” quality of Powell’s third example. I like the darker values I achieved in my most recent drawing, and I’m happy that I achieved a sense of texture, I think.

Overall, though, I’m not sure I see a huge difference between my 2020 drawing and today’s drawing. That’s good, I guess. It shows that despite my two-year break from art, my drawing ability hasn’t declined too much.

I think I do have basic landscape drawing skills, so what I want to work on now is taking my drawings from “quick sketches” to more “finished” drawings. I’ve found my way already toward a sort of “middle ground” somewhere in between the extremes, and I’m not exactly sure where to go from here.

Is it more focus on values that I need? Is it additional work on shading and blending? Is it creating more detail? What is it that my landscape drawings need to reach the “next level”? I think it’s definitely “all of the above”. I think, too, that with patience and practice, I can improve my landscape drawings and achieve the results I want.

So, follow along with me, offer any tips or suggestions you have, and let’s see how far I can go in my quest to be not only a landscape painter, but a graphite landscape artist, as well.