Figure Drawing Atelier: Lessons in the Classical Tradition

"The best way to learn about art is to make it. Discover the secrets of great figure drawing as you sketch along with past and present masters. This working artist's sketchbook guides you from beginning gestures to delicate rendering. It's your art, your tradition, your time. Take your voice and add it to the tradition as if the history of art has saved the best for now."

Figure Drawing Atelier offers a comprehensive, contemporary twist to the very traditional atelier approach to the methods that instruct artists on the techniques they need to successfully draw and ultimately paint the figure.

The book offers art instruction, practical and progressive lessons on drawing the figure, and high-quality sketchbook paper in a beautiful package that includes blank pages for sketching and copying. Artists will then have a record of their process, like with a sketchbook, which many artists like to document and save.

In this elegant and inspiring workbook, master contemporary artist and author Juliette Aristides breaks down the figure drawing process into small, manageable lessons, presents them progressively, introduces time-tested principles and techniques in the atelier tradition that are easily accessible, and shares the language and context necessary to understand the artistic process and create superior, well-crafted drawings.

Atelier education is centered on the belief that working in a studio, not sitting in the lecture hall, is the best way to learn about art. Every artist needs to learn to master figure drawing. Ateliers have produced the greatest artists of all time--and now that educational model is experiencing a renaissance. These studios, a return to classical art training, are based on the nineteenth-century model of teaching artists by pairing them with a master artist over a period of years. Students begin by copying masterworks, then gradually progress to painting as their skills develop.

Figure Drawing Atelier is like having an atelier in a book - and the master is Juliette Aristides, a classically trained artist and best-selling art-instruction author with almost rock star popularity in the contemporary world of representational art. On every page, Aristides uses the works of Old Masters and today's most respected realist artists to demonstrate and teach the principles of realistic figure drawing and painting, taking students step by step through the learning curve yet allowing them to work at their own pace.

Unique and inspiring, this book offers a serious art course for serious art students and beginners alike.

Juliette Aristides is an extraordinary draughts person and artist with a deep and well-rounded education and solid commitment to the atelier movement. She studied at the National Academy of Design, the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Art, and various private ateliers. She is now the director of the Aristides Atelier at the Gage Academy of Art in Seattle, Washington. She is the co-founder of the DaVinci Initiative, which works to bring skill-based art instruction into public education. Aristides exhibits in solo and group shows nationally. Her work can be seen at the John Pence Gallery in San Francisco and the Art Renewal Center Living Masters Gallery online.

Aristides is also the best-selling author of Classical Drawing Atelier, Classical Painting Atelier, Lessons in Classical Drawing, Lessons in Classical Painting, and Beginning Drawing Atelier. Visit her website at AristidesArts.com. She is based in Seattle, Washington.