Pumpkins & Gourds in Charcoal

Sixth Graders spent a chunk of October working on their first observational drawing in their middle school experience (oh, there will be more!). They spent several days learning and practicing how to draw what they see before them, rather than drawing the pumpkin "symbols" they are used to drawing in childhood (perfect circle, lines from top to bottom, step right on top). Then, once they completed a contour line drawing of their still life arrangement, we turned out the lights and put spotlights on the pumpkins and gourds to create better highlights and shadows. The tricky part about the shading on these drawings is that we did the work on black paper and used white charcoal, rather than the usual light paper and shading by adding the dark values. I am so pleased with the beautiful results by my talented kids!

A few action shots:

And the finished works: