Charcoal is a versatile and dramatic medium with incredible potential for expression. This stunning book shows you how to create a drawing using its subtle, complex and bold qualities to best effect. Through step-by-step demonstrations and tasks, it explores the process, explaining how to capture a scene or the feeling of a scene, and, essentially, how best to fix an image to the page. With over 200 illustrations, this beautiful book is a compelling guide for everyone who wants to work with this elusive and powerful medium. Topics covered include: The basics of charcoal - explains the material, its qualities and ways of using it; Charcoal lenses - advises on how to choose interesting subjects with the use of photography and sketchbooks, and how to build a library of visual references; Mark making - includes techniques for complete beginners, as well as more advanced ideas for those hoping to develop and refine their work; Demonstrations - shows how to use the techniques and build a body of work; Soft pastel - suggests ways of combining charcoal with pastel to add colour to your work; Tasks and extensions - gives tips for trying and exploring ideas further to develop your own skills and to create a unique style to your work and finally: Protecting your work - advises on the key techniques used for fixing, photographing, storing and framing your work.

My Icon Library is an essential collection of impactful images that will empower you to embark on your own journey of visual thinking and storytelling. The collection consist of the most common, interesting, weird and wonderful concepts created during the author's visual thinking workshops. The concepts are grouped into categories that regularly crop up at the workshops: 'finance', 'technology', 'innovation', 'agile' and 'sales', as well as broader themes such as 'team dynamics', 'way-of-working', 'politics' and 'the world we live in'. This is not a definitive list: every story is different and has its own blend of icons and visuals. My Icon Library is a source of inspiration and a go-to reference for whenever you need a visual that's a tad too complicated for your imagination or a Google Images search. It also works as a great companion to author's other bestselling books: Visual Thinking and Visual Doing.

This fourth book in the 'Kawaii' series is packed with adorable creatures from a range of cultures and mythologies. In the hands of author-teacher Angela Nguyen, even a three-headed dog is drawn in a style that will have any young artist cooing! This book teaches young readers what kawaii is all about and how to draw any mythical animal in an adorable style. There are clear step-by-step diagrams that are great for visual learners and make it super-easy to follow the instructions. The wonderful beasts are organized by the terrain in which they are found: air, water and land. There is also a section devoted to how young readers can create their own creatures: elephants with tiny wings, bunnies with unfeasibly large ears, and 'mash-ups' like giant bats. Angela has created 'feature spreads' showing imagined landscapes where some of these creatures might safely graze. Taking cuteness to the next level, this wonderful resource makes drawing instantly achievable and great fun!

Focusing on 56 selected works from the 1970s to today, Pushing paper examines why drawing has endured as a method of making art, and explores the vital and fundamental nature of drawing through themes such as systems and process, identity, place and space, time and memory, and power and protest. These broad themes allow for original connections to be made between images, which will inspire all practitioners of drawing. Supported by the Bridget Riley Art Foundation, the book showcases work by major contemporary artists from around the world, including Phyllida Barlow, Louise Bourgeois, Judy Chicago, Adel Daoud, Richard Deacon, Tacita Dean, Peter Doig, Tracey Emin, Richard Hamilton, Jacob El Hanani, David Hockney, Ellen Gallagher, Andrzej Jackowski, Anish Kapoor, Anselm Kiefer, Minjung Kim, Marcia Kure, Nja Mahdaoui, Sol LeWitt, Bahman Mohassess, David Nash, Eduardo Paolozzi, Cornelia Parker, Grayson Perry, Gerhard Richter, Bridget Riley, Susan Schwalb, Hamid Sulaiman, Imran Qureshi, Hajra Waheed and Rachel Whiteread, as well as exciting works by lesser-known artists. Aimed at admirers of drawing, and artists and students alike, Pushing paper provides an arresting analysis of the status of drawing in the world of contemporary art.

Dinosaur skeletons, eggs, bones, and fossils have become increasingly coveted objects for collectors. Dinosaurs are Collectible explores the reasons for their popularity and tells the stories behind the many illustrious finds from the past. This beautifully illustrated and printed publication by the author of Wonders are Collectible and Wunderkammer includes a chapter devoted to dinosaurs in both high and popular culture, and features an exceptional collection of prints, photos, drawings, and micrograph scans.

Delving into Frederick Sandys's unconventional life, Betty Elzea's research reveals much about his complicated and often scandalous relationships. Born and educated in Norwich with an artisan background, Sandys was bohemian by nature, though from necessity, to the world at large, he appeared genteel and respectable. Unfortunately disorganised, un-businesslike and preferring to live alone as a bachelor in lodgings, he struggled to support two growing families of illegitimate children. From youth, developing skills as a draughtsman and painter, he moved to London, meeting Dante Gabriel Rossetti and the Pre-Raphaelites and their associates, while keeping a foothold in Norwich where he maintained friendships and enjoyed the support of the Norfolk gentry and several notable Norwich industrialists. Norfolk landscape painting and nature studies led to commissioned portraiture which became his main source of income. He is known for depictions of beautiful women in legendary disguises as well as meticulously-detailed portraits of elderly women. He also pioneered a new type of large-scale portrait drawing in chalks.

Phaidon's 'Vitamin' series has long proved an extraordinarily accurate predictor of tomorrow's stars. This paperback edition of the latest volume is a cutting-edge and indispensable survey of the very best of contemporary drawing, as chosen by a panel of the world's leading art experts Over the past 50 years, drawing has been elevated from a supporting role to a primary medium, ranking alongside painting as a central art form. Since Phaidon's publication of the first such surveys (Vitamin D in 2005 and D2 in 2013), contemporary artists have continued to explore drawing's possibilities - from intimate to large-scale works, in a diversity of mark-making processes and materials. Vitamin D3 showcases more than 100 such artists, as nominated by a global panel of more than 70 international art experts. The more than 70 nominators include such iconic figures as: Iwona Blazwick, Louisa Buck, Mark Coetzee, Thelma Golden, Laura Hoptman, Geeta Kapur, Pablo Leon de la Barra, Christine Macel, Kate Macfarlane, Hans Ulrich Obrist, and Zoe Whitley. The more than 100 selected artists include: Miriam Cahn, Robert Crumb, Tom Friedman, Tania Kovats, Claudette Johnson, Rashid Johnson, Otobong Nkanga, Toyin Ojih Odutola, Deanna Petherbridge, Christina Quarles, Qiu Zhijie, Nathaniel Mary Quinn, Wael Shawky, Emma Talbot, and Johanna Unzueta.

In Cute Chibi Animals, popular Instagram artist Phoebe Im (@bobblejot) teaches you the art of chibi, step by adorable step. Learn how to master this popular anime and manga drawing style with this book that focuses on drawing 75 animals, including an anteater, chinchilla, manatee, dolphin, sloth, axolotl, pangolin, owl, narwhal, and much more. Chibi is Japanese slang for "short," and the characters in Cute Chibi Animals live up to this description with their cute roly-poly bodies that make them extremely lovable and huggable. Learn how to draw adorable: Mammals Birds Fish Reptiles Amphibians Along with the step-by-step tutorials, Phoebe shares her tips and tricks for drawing the animals with either pen and pencil or digitally; coloring, shading, and highlighting your characters; and giving them accessories for added cuteness. There are also coloring pages in the back of the book for some extra fun. So, get out your drawing supplies and start creating your animal kingdom!

Pocket Art features 100 artistic prompts to unleash your creativity. In Pocket Art, Lorna Scobie, the bestselling author and illustrator of the 365 Days series, encourages you to be confident with your art, embrace mistakes and to have fun along the way. It is full of activities to help kickstart your creativity, and the activities have been divided into three categories - art for relaxing, art for looking and art for inspiration - so you can feel inspired no matter what mood you're in. Full of tips to help spark creative ideas, as well as inspiration and support, Pocket Art is the perfect pocket-sized art book to take with you wherever you go.