Drawing Prompts

Select an above or below point of view (sit on the floor looking up or sit somewhere high looking down) in a specific area. Try your kitchen, bathroom, or outside. Complete this drawing paying attention to details.

Cut out a portion of a magazine or newspaper picture. Glue that picture to a page in your sketchbook. Create a drawing that incorporates the picture into a story. You may use more than one magazine or newspaper image but the artwork should be mostly your added drawing.

Show the gradual transformation of a pair of scissors into another object. For example: scissors into shark

Look at yourself in a spoon. Draw the distorted image.

Illustrate a dream you had using 5 household objects

Practice observational drawing by drawing the following:ShoesThe corner of a room in your houseAn arrangement of objects including a lit lamp or flashlight (pay close attention to the shadows it creates)Your petCreative views of your car, bicycle, skateboard, etc

What if you suddenly became very small?

Study your feet. Create a strong black contour (line drawing) of your shoes or bare feet from different angles. Let the drawings overlap each other until you fill the page.

Draw something from the outside of your house. It can be a plant, part of the building, objects on the porch, etc.

Crunch some empty soda cans. Draw them very close up, focusing on the reflections you see in the metal

Pop some popcorn. Take a few kernels and look at the shapes and shades. With pencil and shading study a few of the kernels and fill the page with them.

Design a vehicle. It can be a car, spaceship, airplane, boat, motorcycle, etc. Or you can invent your own new type of transportation!

Practice drawing your hands using a continuous line. Do not pick up your pencil or pen for the drawing. Look closely at details like creases, fingernails, and knuckles. Next use the same technique and a mirror too make a continuous line drawing of your face. Then, shield your drawing paper with an object so you can't see what you are drawing and draw another set of continuous line faces and hands, looking only the object being drawn and not at your paper. No cheating!

Draw a single flower with all of its leaves, petals, and imperfections

Draw a close-up of a cluttered space

Draw a pile of dishes in the sink. (Then put them in the dishwasher!)

Draw your favorite food, including the wrapper if it has one

Draw a closeup of a set of keys

Draw your sunglasses including the reflections

Draw your phone with the last photograph you took on the screen

Draw a view out of your window. Show both the inside of the room and the outside.

Draw a magnifying glass and what it is magnifying as well as the space around it

Draw your school books positioned in an interesting way

Create a drawing of your choice based on one or more of these ideas:Dreams and NightmaresLife and DeathSpiritualitySufferingOppositesPowerHybridsBody imageGamesSecretsJourneyTransformationThe futureIsolationHeroesConflictIllusionMachinesAgingMemory

Start by shading your entire page black with pencil or charcoal. While looking in the mirror, use an eraser to create the light areas of your face, while leaving the dark areas alone. It may be helpful to squint, which removes the detail and allows you to see the simple lights and darks.

Drape a piece of fabric over a complex object and draw it, paying close attention to the shadows.

CREATE A BESTIARY

Bestiaries are medieval paintings of imaginary or mythical animals. They were often a combination of multiple animals. For example, a griffin is part lion and part eagle. The animal was painted with a simple background and an elaborate border.

Answer these questions about the bestiary you want to create:

1. What is your beast's name?

2. Completely describe your beast. Include textures, patterns, and resemblances to other animals.

3. What special powers does your beast have?

4. Where does your beast live? Is it nocturnal? Does it prefer a cave, the water, a nest, a house?

5. On a separate sheet draw and paint or color your beast. Don't forget to create a background and border!

Student Example: Bestiary

Creating a Narrative

Narrative art is art that tells a story. Choose one of the following famous story beginnings and write 5-7 sentences describing what you think should happen next. Then create a drawing or painting that tells the story you just wrote.

Once upon a time, there was a woman who discovered she had turned into the wrong person.

Something a little strange, that's what you notice, that she's not a woman like all the others.

It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen.

I joined the baboon troop during my twenty-first year.

My date had been dead for two weeks when we arrived at the prom.

Someone must have slandered Josef K, for one morning, without having done anything truly wrong, he was arrested.

It was a wrong number that started it, the telephone ringing three times in the dead of night, and the voice on the other end asking for someone he was not.

In the beginning, sometimes I left messages in the street.

As Gregor Samsa awoke from a night of uneasy dreaming, he found himself transformed in his bed intoa gigantic insect.

The drought had lasted now for ten million years, and the reign of the terrible lizards had long since ended.

Student Examples: Narrative art

Create a Friend

Imagine a friend for yourself. They can be human, animal, cupcake, preying mantis-- there are no rules.

What does your friend look like?

Where do they live?

What do they eat?

What do they do for fun?

Create a home for your friend. Go to https://www.instructables.com/id/Classic-Origami-Box/ to createan origami box, or use a shoebox or other small box. Paint or color the inside of the box to create your friend's home. Do they live in a cave? Under the ocean? In space? If you're using a cardboard box youcan line it with white paper so that it's easier to paint/color.

Next, create at least 3 objects for your friend to have in their home. Draw these objects on paper. Cut out the objects, leaving a tab at the bottom of each object so it can be attached to your box. Fold the tab so the object will stand up (see examples below) and attach it to the bottom or sides of your box. You can use tape or glue. Don't forget the color the objects for your friend! Finally, create your friend!Draw them on paper and cut them out, leaving a tab to attach them to their home. Fold the tab and glueor tape your friend to the box. Wave hello to your friend!

Student examples:

Creativity Building Words for Sketchbooks

Take the idea of a simple object and:

Add: expand, advance, supplement, magnify

Subtract: simplify, omit, remove

Repeat: reiterate, echo, restate, duplicate

Combine: connect, arrange, link, unify, mix, merge, bring together

Transfer: adapt, relocate, dislocate, transpose

Empathize: sympathize, relate to the subject, put yourself in its shoes, transpose your self into your subject

Superimpose: overlap, cover, place over, overlay

Change Scale: bigger, smaller, change proportions

Fragment: separate, divide, split, take apart, dissect, disassemble

Isolate: separate, set apart, detach, use only part of the subject, crop

Distort: twist, misshape, melt, crush

Disquise: camouflage, conceal, deceive, hide, mask

Contradict: deny, reverse, make opposite, flip-flop

Parody: mimic, ridicule, mock, visual pun, make it funny

Analyze: compare, draw associations, seek similarities

Hybridize: combine two unlikely things

Metamorphose: transform, convert, progression

Mythologize: create a myth around the subject

Fantasize: think “what if” thoughts, imagine, think outside the box

Draw Only What You Are Told

Get together a collection of small objects like scissors, brushes, hole punch, tools, kitchen utensils, etc. Try to get a variety of shapes. Sit back to back with your partner. One partner should have a pencil andsketchbook. The other partner should be blindfolded. The blindfolded partner is handed an object and told to describe it using observational terms without naming it or telling its function. For examples: “it has a long bit sticking out that tapers toward the end.” The description may include any aspect of the object but must not mention anything that points to or indicates its function. The partner who is not blindfolded will attempt to draw what is described to them without seeing the object or knowing what itis. Partners should change positions and play again so that each person gets a turn describing and a turn drawing.

This game can also be done with photos of animals and that can be very fun and interesting as well.

Exquisite Corpse Drawing

This is a popular party game from the surrealist movement and requires at least 3 players. Take one piece of paper for each player and fold it into thirds. Set a timer for 10 minutes. Each player begins by drawing a head on the top third of their paper. There are no rules except that it must be a head (human, animal, fantasy etc.) and that it must only use the top third of the page. When the timer goes off everyone folds the paper so that only the bottom 2/3 are visible and passes their paper to someone else. The timer is reset. The players then draw a body on the middle third of the paper. Again, it can be any kind of body but it can only take up the middle third. When the timer goes off the second time everyone folds their paper so that only the bottom third is visible and passes it to someone who has not yet had it. The timer is reset and everyone spends the last 10 minutes drawing the legs and feet. At the end of the 10 minutes the papers are held up for everyone to see and giggle