Book Review: Beautiful Landscapes by Diane Wright

Diane Wright (2007) Beautiful Landscapes. Walter Foster.

It's the last day of October, so just time for one last Big Draw Book Review. This will be a quick one, but as I've only just received the book from Amazon, I can't resist it.

Diane Wright is an extremely accomplished graphite artist, rather in the mold of Mike Sibley, the subject of my previous review. Indeed, Diane is a great admirer of Mike's work, and considers him to be her mentor. Therefore, the style of work shown in the two books is very similar. However, Diane's book is a very slim volume, just 64 pages, and can be picked up very cheaply ($9.95 direct from her web site). In a sense, then, it is an "entry-level" version of Sibley's book, though this description doesn't give Diane enough credit as a fine artist in her own right.

As the title indicates, this book focusses entirely on landscape drawing. The first part of the book is devoted to drawing major landscape elements, with particular emphasis on trees. Diane's tree drawings are a delight in themselves, and I personally would love to have a book of hers devoted entirely to this subject. In fact, you can follow a tree tutorial on her website, and also find it in the Drawing and Sketching forum on WetCanvas!

The largest part of the book, however, consists of Diane taking us step-by-step through a series of wonderful drawings of subjects as diverse as Kirkwall Harbour and the Sonoma Desert. The book is worth many times more than its price just to look at the finished drawings, but the advice contained in them is invaluable. I haven't had the chance to read through the whole book in detail yet, but I'm sure it will repay careful study.

Diane is a lovely person, as well as a great artist. I hope this book does very well for her; it would certainly do very well for your art! Highly recommended.