Thanks istara!
I was going to mention, a pencil artist that has done some work I like is JD Hilllberry. He has some still lifes and Trompe L’Oeil drawings that are amazing. He uses graphite and charcoal (I believe).
Daym, those are good. That’s what I like about these boards - full of talented people. And you don’t even find out about those talents for years.
Most of all, I’m blown away that pencil drawing appears to be as full of controvosy and argument as any other discipline. Who knew?
Now who wants to see my picture of a house, done aged 5? 
pan
I know. Who knew we could get this passionate? I mean, I knew how I felt, and I knew how some of the other artists on the art message board felt, but we tried to keep our passionate feelings low-key. But this woman who emailed me—she was obviously so worked up that I dare criticize this revered graphite smearing technique that she had to contact me!
It sure has been nice to see that there are many other kindred spirits on this controversy!
Oooh, send me the tutorial! Even though I suck at drawing.
Seriously, I loved art in high school, my paintings-technically, they were bad. They weren’t good technically, at all.
And yet, I had a blast painting them and I loved drawing and sketching and coloring.
It’s Trisha Romance, isn’t it? Although she appears to be Canadian, so you might not have heard of her. Anyway, take a look at her collection if you want to see some incredibly popular and unbelievably clichéd stuff. Man, I hate that shit.
-does search for “Trisha Romance”*
-finds site.
-runs screaming back to Amy Brown.
*is that her real name? That is fake as all get out! The female Thomas Kinkade!!!
:eek:
Ooh. I’ve never heard of Tricia Romance. She’s horrible. Yeesh. Thanks for sharing.
No, this woman teaches smeared graphite only. I have seen some of her work that is OK, but a lot of it has problems. And, even the stuff that is OK isn’t that good—just “OK”. But that isn’t the reason for my objections to her, even. It’s the “junk art techniques” that she teaches. Well, some of it is junk. I believe she leaves her students with the impression that they’ve learned all they need to know—they now can “draw”, because they use the grid system. (The grid system, when overused or misused, can be very limiting. The word “crutch” is often used by her detractors.) Most traditional art methods teach many different techniques and this woman doesn’t. Far from it.
My sympathies go out to any of her students who then go on to any “regular” art class, where they will most likely be quite unprepared.
Guin: I forgot to mention this before because I am enamoured with my new scanner (just bought it tonight! 
) but I also wanted to tell you—the fact that you enjoyed art in school is profoundly important. Your supposed “lack of technical skill” is not as important as you think, and very often can be overcome very easily. (Art skill is like any other skill—practice and study make you improve!) The big deal with art is having a love and passion for it. I get the impression that you have a great deal of feeling for art and therefore have a great deal of potential.
You’re quite welcome, yose. You can’t walk into any art store in Calgary without seeing a Trisha Romance section as big and ugly as the Thomas Kink-aid section. I thought I should share my pain.
Yosemitebabe, I read this thread with interest, but not knowing the second thing about producing quality art (I do know the first thing – I have no skill at it, so I don’t), I have nothing to add except that I think it’s almost certainly an annoyance in any discipline when somebody trying to share some expertise is criticized by someone who just discovered some “cheat technique” that has been known for years by others, and disused by them because there are other ways to accomplish the end, perhaps harder but achieving results of higher quality.
That said, I can’t resist a gentle kidding about your thread title – I can’t imagine anyone soliciting criticism from the clueless – “Hi, I realize you don’t know Jack Squat about what I make a living doing and have a national reputation at, but would you be so kind as to look my stuff over and tell me how you think I can improve it?”