Our lesson on how to draw a parrot in a pop art style is a demonstration of the steps involved in creating our parrot painting above. The image was influenced by the art of Andy Warhol and created with gouache (an opaque form of watercolour) on white paper.

 

 

Drawing a Parrot: Step 1

THE LINE DRAWING: The first step in our parrot painting is to create a pencil study in line that will assist with the next stage of the work.

TECHNIQUE: Your pencil study should be drawn in line only. Note how the details of the parrot's feathers have been hatched in line.

 

Drawing a Parrot: Step 2

THE BRUSH DRAWING: The second step in our parrot drawing is to ink or paint over the pencil study to create a brush drawing.

TECHNIQUE: You can use black gouache or indian ink applied with a fine sable brush to paint over your pencil study. Alternatively, a black 'brush point' felt pen will do a similar job.

 

Drawing a Parrot: Step 3

ERASING THE ORIGINAL IMAGE: The third step in our parrot drawing is to erase the pencil lines of the original study to leave a clean black and white brush drawing.

TECHNIQUE: Make sure that you give the medium you chose for your brush drawing plenty of time to dry. You may smudge your image if you try to erase the pencil lines too early.

 

 

Drawing a Parrot: Step 4

AN ABSTRACT BACKGROUND: The fourth step in our parrot drawing is to create an abstract background.

TECHNIQUE: A piece of tracing paper was placed over our brush drawing and an abstract design, that roughly conforms to the shapes of the parrot, was sketched over it.

 

 

Drawing a Parrot: Step 5

TRANSFERRING THE BACKGROUND: The fifth step in our parrot drawing is to transfer the abstract background onto a sheet of white paper.

TECHNIQUE: You transfer the background drawing by using a 'trace and transfer' technique:

 

 

Drawing a Parrot: Step 6

COLOURING THE BACKGROUND: The sixth step in our parrot drawing is to paint the abstract background using gouache.

TECHNIQUE: The advantage of using gouache is that it provides a flat matt surface which best emphasises the properties of colour and shape. The colours for background were chosen because they relate to the subject as they are all associated with the natural colours of parrots.

 

 

Drawing a Parrot: Step 7

THE FINAL IMAGE: The final step in our pop art parrot picture is to transfer the brush drawing of the bird onto the abstract background.

TECHNIQUE: Trace the brush drawing of the parrot and transfer its image onto the background using the 'trace and transfer' method explained in Step 5. Then by repeating Steps 2 and 3 again, ink or paint over the transferred pencil drawing and clean up the final image.

 

Now view the development of our images for the Pop Art Parrot