Key Concepts:
Fine Arts Media
Purposes of Drawing
Drawing Media
Dry Media
· Metal Point
· Chalk
· Charcoal
· Graphite
· Pastel
Liquid Media (also referred to as wet media)
· Pen and ink
· Wash and brush
Key Terms:
medium - Any material used to create a work of art. Plural form, media.
draw - to pull, push or drag a marking tool across a surface to leave a line or mark
cartoon - As distinct from common usage, where it refers to a drawing with humorous content, any full size drawing, subsequently transferred to the working surface, from which a painting or fresco is made.
sketch - a rough drawing representing the chief features of an object or scene and often made as a preliminary study
metalpoint - A drawing technique, especially silverpoint, popular in the 15th and 16th centuries, in which a stylus with a point of gold, silver, or some other metal was applied to a sheet of paper treated with a mixture of powdered bones (or lead white) and gumwater.
silverpoint - See metalpoint.
charcoal - a soft drawing material made of charred wood
fixative - a thin liquid film sprayed over charcoal and pastel drawings to protect them from smudging.
graphite- a drawing material made of soft carbon discovered in England in 1564
pencil - A drawing tool made of graphite encased in a soft wood cylinder.
Conté crayon - A soft drawing tool made by adding clay to graphite.
pastel - A soft crayon made of chalk and pigment. Also any work done in this medium.
pigments - The coloring agents of a medium.
binder - In a medium, the substance that holds pigments together.
heightening - The addition of highlights to a drawing by the application of white or some other pale color.
wash - Large flat areas of ink or watercolor diluted with water and applied by brush.
Key People:
Giorgio Vasari - wrote Lives of the Painters in 1550. Considered drawing as the foundation of painting and amassed a large collection of Renaissance drawing.
Nicolas-Jacques Conté - Frenchman, who around 1795 developed a process for making pencil leads that is still in use today. The process, known as the Conté Process, involves the mixing of finely powdered graphite with finely ground clay particles and shaping and baking the mixture. By controlling the ratio of clay to graphite, varying degrees of hardness can be obtained, as well as fairly consistent and reproducible quality from batch to batch.