9 Best Art Books For Beginners: Age Is No Boundary

Best Art Books of 2020

1. Perspective Made Easy by Ernest Norling
2. Figure Drawing For All It’s Worth by Andrew Loomis
3. Vilppu Drawing Manual by Glenn Vilppu
4. Light For Visual Artists by Richard Yot
5. The Natural Way To Draw by Kimon Nicolaides
6. Drawing On The Right Side Of The Brain by Betty Edwards
7. Keys To Drawing by Bert Dodson
8. Drawing For The Absolute And Utter Beginner by Claire Watson Garcia
9. Drawing For The Absolute Beginner by Mark Willenbrink

1. Perspective Made Easy by Ernest Norling

Perspective is one of the fundamental art skills you will have to understand and master to create masterpieces or construction plans. What perspective does, is that it takes a 2D drawing and creates the illusion of depth.

This particular title takes what sounds like a somewhat complicated concept and explains it in an easy to understand manner. Some of the items you will learn about range from horizon lines to vanishing lines and all the details in-between.

2. Figure Drawing For All It’s Worth by Andrew Loomis

Let’s get this out there first – drawing the human figure is a difficult task for a beginner. It’s not easy nor is it fun at times. But this book will change how you view the task of figure drawing by explaining it to you in a way that makes it easy.

The author does a great job of breaking down the process of figure drawing into various stages ranging from seeing the figure to how to construct it. The techniques you will learn here will give you a fresh perspective.

3. Vilppu Drawing Manual by Glenn Vilppu

This volume was privately published by the author and is considered one of the greatest guides on the subject of drawing. The two main concepts covered in this book are gesture drawing and form construction and is particularly aimed at the beginner or semi-experienced beginner

Considering that Vilppu has been teaching art for decades, you will pick up details, tips, and tricks just from his years of experience that you won’t get in any other teaching tool.

4. Light For Visual Artists by Richard Yot

Light and shadow are part of another fundamental skill of drawing. As far as books go in teaching how to accomplish this as well as understanding the skill, this book is a must-have.

In it, you will discover the physics and artistic techniques required to add light and shadow to your drawings. In other words, the author takes a complicated and involved concept and explains it in such a way that you will be adding shadow and light to doodles by this evening.

5. The Natural Way To Draw by Kimon Nicolaides

If you have ever wanted to take a complete art course but did not have the time to dedicate to classroom study, this book is for you. That’s because it is that full art course stuffed into the pages of this volume.

You will learn how to draw figures and objects in a quick sketch form and if you follow the study tips correctly, you should be able to draw anything you see well enough to look as close to real as possible. This is an intense book, but well worth flipping through.

6. Drawing On The Right Side Of The Brain by Betty Edwards

This has been called the perfect art beginner’s book by many. In it, there are plenty of exercises that teach a complete understanding of perspective, negative space, and values. The text is written in such a way that each concept is described in a manner that is easy to understand and apply.

Need to figure out how to get those ideas from your imagination onto paper? This book will get you thinking in ways you didn’t before and that will help you to unlock your brain’s right side.

7. Keys To Drawing by Bert Dodson

Another one of those books you will find on lists of art books for beginners, this volume truly deserves to be on those lists. The author not only teaches drawing but explains in this book the importance of controlling your elbow and shoulder motion when drawing to create the most accurate lines on paper.

The main concept covered is drawing from life and the text is easy to understand which makes the concept also much easier to grasp and work with.

8. Drawing For The Absolute And Utter Beginner by Claire Watson Garcia

If the title doesn’t quite do the job, trust us when we say that this book has the most accurate title we have seen in a long time. It focuses on still life drawing – which is a good start for any beginner.

The lessons take you from constructing the outside contours to constructing shapes and volume to complete your work. Each lesson includes an explanation of what you should be learning as part of the exercise which makes learning to draw a bit more fun.

9. Drawing For The Absolute Beginner by Mark Willenbrink

Subtitled: A Clear & Easy Guide To Successful Drawing, this book is a close second in the accurate title race and the content is well worth taking a look at.

The author helps you to understand form, perspective, lighting, and other art fundamentals. He does this with 24 different demonstrations that fill the 128-page volume. It starts with basics and works up from there and you should be sketching actively by the time you finish this incredible beginner’s book.