An Untamed Heart

Have you ever wanted to draw and paint wildlife, realistically?
I want to let you in on a little secret to representative art, and it might not be what you think…

To create realistic bird and animal portraiture you need three essential things - curiosity, compassion, and courage. Your supplies don’t matter nearly as much as these three things, talent does not matter at all. There is no secret hack to realistic art, and it is a form of art that is available to everyone. You don’t need talent. You do need practice - which is only time and skill building. You absolutely need curiosity, compassion and courage though.

Curiosity - allow yourself to become completely absorbed, in awe and wonder of the incredible intricacies of our other-than-human kin.

Compassion - for our subjects, and for ourselves. Find that connection, one wild heart to another, a deep compassion, empathy, and caring towards your subject, towards the life that you are honouring.

Courage - to start, and to keep going. Courage to keep showing up, to practice, to have a go, to follow your wild heart.

In An Untamed Heart, we are going to take simple supplies - a sketchbook that can cope with wet media, pencils, pen and paint - and use curiosity, compassion, and courage to connect to birds of prey. I will show you step by step how to sketch from a reference without any complicated formulas, and how to paint realistically by using many layers of glazes to build up light and form and create depth and character. These lessons are designed to help kindle that curiosity you have about realistic wildlife art, and to set your skill-building on the right path.

So, gather your curiosity, compassion and courage, and join me in An Untamed Heart!