From "Exploring the Portrait/Self-Portrait" Glenn Hirsch, Instructor www.glennhirsch.com

1. Hands
Exploring the Portrait/Self-Portrait
Glenn Hirsch, Instructor

2. Hands
In the 18th-19th
century, student
competitions
were held at the
Ecole des Beaux
Arts in Paris.
Nicolas de
Largillierre, 1715

3. Hand gestures have
universal meaning.
Nelly Nassif

4. Hand gestures have universal meaning.
Emma Mankin

5. Hand gestures have universal meaning
Rob Huegel

6. Hand gestures suggest narrative
Michelangelo

7. Fingers touch
Peggy Millar

8. Hand to the temple
suggests thought
Cynthia Kanios

9. Hand to the
temple, sug
gests
thought
Matisse

10. The hand is
a place for
ornament
Ilya Repin

11. Subtle distortion of the fingers
Botticelli

13. Botticelli

14. Hands point the
way and the eye
follows.
Leonardo

15. Hands suggest narrative
Max Beckmann

16. Hands with props –
suggest narrative.
Max Beckmann

17. Hands with props –
suggest narrative.
Max Beckmann

18. Hands with props –
suggest narrative.
Otto Dix

19. Hands with props –
suggest narrative.
Edvard Munch

20. Hands with props –
suggest narrative.
Steve Chapman

21. Take away the hand …
and you take away a
person’s power.
Arshile Gorky

22. Structure of the Hand

23. The hand is as big as
the face
Carolyn Wales

24. The hand is
as big as the
face
Glenn Hirsch

25. Hands appear bigger as they get closer to the viewer
John Reamer

26. Hands appear bigger as they get closer to the viewer
Gene Faktorovich

27. Find the rectangle

28. Exaggerate the
geometry of the
wrist

29. When trying to get the
right size of the
hand, start with a
simplified “paddle”
shape

30. Or simplify the hand
into a ‘mitten’ shape
August Macke

31. Exaggerate geometry
in the fingers
Cynthia Kanios (detail)

32. Exaggerate geometry in the
fingers
Steve Chapman (detail)

33. Finger tips are angular in shape
Steve Chapman (detail)

34. Finger tips are
angular in shape
Emma Mankin

35. Fingers foreshortened
Michelangelo study

36. Practice!
Even Leonardo da Vinci
had to practice