Course Description

Join Pam Carriker and her course, The Working Art Journal – the practice of keeping and integrating sketchbooks and art journals to explore self portraits.

Creating a self-portrait can be a daunting task but through the exercises in this course I will guide you on a journey to discovering the essence of you as we layer and mix media in a variety of ways. I love to explore media in my art journal. It’s very freeing and forgiving and it becomes a document of our journey as an artist.

Focusing on several forms of dry mediums we will try both dry and wet techniques using a ‘selfie’ photo as the inspiration. We will be using both a sketchbook and an art journal as we play back and forth using our sketches to further explore our faces in our journals.

I will share some of my favorite supplies and techniques in this ‘no paint’ approach to create beautiful, neutral palette, art journal pages. Working with neutral tones really allows you to focus on both the lights and darks and the seen and unseen properties that compose a face.

Create self-portraits without fear using my face mapping technique and your ‘selfie’ as the inspiration to finding your artistic voice through art journaling.

Techniques Taught in this Course

-Creating custom Value Finder tool
-Face mapping technique
-Sketching with mechanical, woodless graphite, flat and varied value pencils
-Water soluble graphite portrait study
-Oiled and colored charcoal wash portrait study
-Conte Crayon Ghosting Method portrait study
-PanPastel and water soluble media portrait study
-Working on toned paper
-Collage with vintage papers
-Multiple ways to re-use sketches in your art journal
-Mixing a muted color palette with dry media and gesso
-Adding your voice to your journal pages
-Self-portrait art journaling