Customer Reviews

Work Small, Learn Big! Sketching with Pen & Watercolor: 17 International Artists Show You the Fast Way to Build Your Painting Skills

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is both a great coffee table book and a great guide for artists. This is not a book of step by step instruction for drawing or painting objects. Instead, each chapter is given to a different artist to explain their materials and methods in pen and watercolor sketching.

I appreciated the way each artist listed the materials that make up their sketch kit, from the type of pen to the paper, usually accompanied by a photograph of the whole thing. The artist then goes on to explain their approach, accompanied by numerous illustrations and pictures. There are so many different approaches covered here that you are sure to find some inspiration for your own work.

The works displayed in this book are outstanding. While some artists here use the sketch to prepare for a painting, many have the sketch as a final goal. I personally get much more enjoyment out of looking at sketches than at finished works.

If you use a sketchbook, watercolors or pens i can't recommend this highly enough.

I buy way too many art, drawing and how to books. Too many because a lot of the books just have terribly cramped or uptight art in them. This is not one of them. Often books either have good technical information but the art looks bad; or the art is really good but the instruction goes from a sketch to the final painting in one and a half sentence. This is one of the books where instruction as well as the quality of the art are both interesting.

If you like pen/ink/wash sketches or if you've been doing a lot of pen sketching and you want to add some washes, this book will give you lots of examples and progress shots, mostly of environments, buildings, sheds, nature, streets. The implementations of the pen/wash method are varied and are shown to you by various artists (roughly 15 artists - each having roughly 6 pages to show their method), and my guess is you will find some that will suit you, or that you can use as a base for for your own way of doing things.

Educational as well as inspirational. 5 stars.

Learn new watercolor & sketching skills by creating small versions with this super book of clearly diagramed steps, by a variety of artists around the world. From realism to quick sketches, this wonderful book is loaded with great ideas and examples. A must have for any sketchbook artist!

Reasons why I highly recommend this book...
* Lots of inspiration for different techniques to try
* Lists of art supplies the artists prefer is very helpful
* The artists are actually very good, unlike some books
* The book itself is nicely designed
* I have a fascination with other artists' sketchbooks
* It's my new favorite book

Maybe I am missing something, but the real price of the book is $27.99 and I know I didn't even pay that for it. Now I see it's gone down a lttle, from over $100 to $99.00. It's a good book, but not worth these prices! That is why the 4 star review. If it were selling at a realistic price, I'd give it the 5 stars too..