Lenn Redman - How to Draw Caricatures

Copyright 1984 by Lenn Redman. All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the United States Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced or distributed in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

ISBN: 978-0-07-181276-4
MHID: 0-07-181276-8

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I dedicate this book to the wonderful people whose photographs and caricatures appear herein. I am grateful to them for the trust they showed in me. They all gave me permission to reproduce their likenesses and then analyze their faces for caricatural interpretation. That took courage and trust in my judgment, for they did so in advance, having seen neither the photographs, caricatures, nor written text.

They were unreservedly cooperative and displayed good humor while posing for their photographs. They have my profoundest respect.

LENN REDMANTeaching at Los Angeles Community Services Pierce College, Woodland Hills, California

Special thanks to Rosemary Tharps for assembling for this book a large variety of people who have subsequently become my friends. Her cooperation in this respect saved me much valuable time.

I am also grateful to Vincent Rondone for opening his studio to me, arranging proper lighting, and supervising me as I photographed these wonderful people.

This book is written with the desire to aid a vast range of people, including professional artists, art students, and those who have no interest in art per se but who want to learn how to draw caricatures just for the fun of it.

There has been a need for such a book for a very long time. I became aware of it at age 16 when I first developed an interest in caricaturing. With a strong desire to learn how to draw caricatures, I bought every book on the subject I could findand have continued to do so until this day. My library consists of anthologies of caricatures, anecdotes of the artists experiences, photographs of the artists engaged in drawing celebrities, and histories on the art. But other than a page I wrote on the subject in Our Wonderful World, a young peoples encyclopedia published by the Spencer Press, Inc., in 1955, I have never seen a single, instructional guide on how to draw caricatures. The result is that some of the finest artistsartists who can wrap rings around me with their drawings and paintings of portraits, landscapes, seascapes, still lifesare completely lost when it comes to drawing caricatures. I hope this book helps thembut I am particularly anxious to help the art student who wants to include caricaturing among his or her studies, and those people who are interested in learning to draw caricatures just for the fun of it.

I found out what a terrific hobby caricaturing is when I first began teaching. It was at an adult evening class at the Chicago Central YMCA early in 1963. I had expected my students to be young with ambitions to become professional cartoonists. What a surprise it was for me on the first day of the semester to see my class was composed of many people who were middle-aged and older! One of my students was in his 80s. They were from all walks of life. A doctor, a mathematics teacher, and a window washer were among them.

Why has there been such a dearth of information on how to draw caricatures? I believe it is due to the erroneous belief that caricaturing cannot be taughtthat those of us who are able to draw them are endowed with something special in our genes. Perhaps to some extent that is true, but I know from experience as a teacher that everyone, including those who may have no special artistic talent, can learn to draw caricatures at least well enough for their own amusement and enjoyment. Believe me, it is enjoyable.

The beginner need not be concerned over the quality of paper to draw on. Ordinary typing paper is satisfactory. Even cheap newsprint will suffice. But the type of pencil you use will make a difference. Soft lead pencils are better than hard lead pencils for caricaturing. The hard leads are usually categorized with the letter H; they are used for mechanical drawing. The soft leads are categorized with the letter B. They range from B1 to B6the higher the number, the softer the lead. B3s are ideal; they make satisfactorily dark broad lines that run smoothly over the paper. For the time being, stay away from carbon pencils and charcoal pencils. They tend to drag over the paper and will slow you down. Later, theyll serve you wellafter you have learned how to exaggerate your subjects features. At that time you may wish to render your caricatures with various shaded effects accomplishable with carbon, charcoal, and other media.