Icons with Colored Pencils

 As some of you know, I have been spending much of Coronatide in drawing what I call “quick icons” of the saints on the Calendar of The Episcopal Church. I did the earliest of these some years ago with pen and ink, then shifted to watercolor pencils. Lately I have begun working with regular colored pencils — unlike the watercolor pencils, which have a dusty or dry finish, regular colored pencils have a waxy content, which allows them better coverage while retaining a degree of translucency. In this, they are remarkably like tempera, my favored — though time-consuming — medium

I decided as well to go back to the masters, in this case Cennino Cennini, whose medieval essay on technique records many details of how one is to work with tempera and fresco. I've adapted this for colored pencils, and the animation above shows the basic sequence. This is an icon of Joseph of Arimathea. Here are the details of each step, with the color of pencil* and what is done with it:

1. Black — limn out the darkest shadows and bare outlines

2. Pea Green — lightly wash over the whole surface of the eventual flesh (this is where Terre Verte would be laid over in fresco and tempera).

3. Blue Green — lightly green over the dark shadows.

4. Olive Green Light — work up the shadows and shape them.

5. Carmine — lightly add red to lips, corners of eyes, and very lightly to the nose and cheeks (what Cennino calls the “little apples”).

6. Blush Pink — over the cheeks and lips to blend, introducing a bit of highlighting.

7. Beige — begin to introduce the midtones of flesh into the shadows, but do not go completely into the green, leaving some to show through.

8. Light Peach — lighter tones of the flesh, blended into the midtones.

9. Salmon Pink — wash over the whole face, including into the green. (A different color might be used as a wash for other skin characteristics, using raw or burnt ochre.) This stage I find almost magically transforms the image into the flesh tone and texture desired.

10. Dark Brown — reestablish the shadows and fine dark lines (eyes, nostrils, mouth) that have been dulled by the wash in step 9.

11. Black — reinforce the darkest lines and shadows.

12. White — the whites of the eyes and brightest highlights on the eyelids, cheekbones, nose, lips.

13. White India Ink with fine brush — because the waxy layers prevent the white pencil in step 12 from being as completely opaque as desired, a few touches of white India ink with a very fine brush will accomplish the bright highlights in eyes (and whites of eyes), tip of nose, and any other spot requiring it.

Hope this proves helpful and instructive to those interested in applying old techniques to new media.

Tobias Stanislas Haller BSG

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*In this case the color names are those assigned by the maker (Blick) though I've included shots of the pencils themselves in the graphics.