In this lesson, we are going to bring together all of the structure and anatomy of the head and neck we’ve been studying in order to create a fully rendered portrait drawing from a live model.

Students are encouraged to work from the NMA reference images and 3D viewer included on this page*, or from a live model.

Join Ukrainian-born artist Iliya Mirochnik as he passes on a 250-year-old academic method preserved at the Repin Academy in Saint Petersburg, Russia and seldom taught outside of the Academy and never before on camera.

The Russian Academic drawing and painting approaches were uninterrupted by the modern art movements that transformed representational art in the West, and as a result, they provide a unique and clear lineage to the greater art traditions of the past. As a powerful approach that is both constructive and depictive, it combines the two methods that prevail in contemporary representational art.