Drawing Courses in London
At City Lit, we have a variety of drawing courses, delivered in our bright, modern studios for students to create and develop a body of drawing work. Supported by our team of experienced and expert tutors, we offer students both a practical guide and an informative insight, providing an opportunity for all levels to explore traditional and contemporary styles of drawing.
We have classes for everyone, whether you’re a complete beginner and you want an introduction to drawing; or you’re at an intermediate or higher level and you want classes that focus on developing advanced drawing skills such as mark making techniques, experimental approaches and use of colour, tone and shade within these disciplines.
Our courses are specially designed to offer you support in overcoming any frustrations, learning new skills and helping you achieve your personal creative goals.
We host exhibitions throughout the year at City Lit Gallery where our students showcase their amazing work.
To arrange a conversation with our drawing coordinator about your interests, options and courses available, please contact our Visual Arts team at visualarts@citylit.ac.uk
- Drawing: colour pastel techniques
Course start date: Mon 12 May 2025 (and 2 other dates)Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Ro SylvesterExplore the versatility and rich colours of this beautiful drawing and painting medium. Through practical exercises, discover its potential to create a variety of surface effects and its suitability for sketching and outdoor colour work.Full fee £199.00 Senior fee £159.00 Concession £129.00 - Collage and mixed media: experimental approaches Course start date: Tue 3 Jun 2025 (and 1 other date)
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Ruth BrisonCollage is an exciting, accessible and creative medium. Experiment with a rich variety of materials and found images to make vibrant work experimenting with surface, form, colour and pattern, inspired by artists who make effective use of this way of working.Full fee £229.00 Senior fee £183.00 Concession £149.00 - Life drawing after work Course start date: Thu 5 Jun 2025 (and 4 other dates)
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Joe RichardsonA fun, relaxed and shorter life drawing class better suited for people coming straight from work. You will be able to work from a variety of life models, in a range of materials and with a variety of poses. You will be working from the unclothed model, both male and female.Full fee £149.00 Senior fee £149.00 Concession £149.00 - Drawing: ink and wash techniques Course start date: Fri 6 Jun 2025 (and 2 other dates)
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Jack DuplockThe immediacy and versatility of ink and wash is perfect for those sketching on location, for designers and for students interested in watercolour techniques. Take the opportunity to explore the basic techniques of this exciting process.Full fee £199.00 Senior fee £159.00 Concession £129.00 - Introduction to collage and mixed media Course start date: Sun 8 Jun 2025 (and 1 other date)
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Sam HannerCollage is an exciting, accessible and creative medium. Experiment with a rich variety of materials and found images to make vibrant work experimenting with surface, form, colour and pattern, inspired by artists who make effective use of this way of working.Full fee £279.00 Senior fee £223.00 Concession £181.00 - Explore your creativity Course start date: Thu 26 Jun 2025 (and 1 other date)
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Ro SylvesterTap into your artistic talents through a series of fun practical exercises that will help you start drawing, painting, looking at art, responding to the world around you and working with your imagination and ideas.Full fee £229.00 Senior fee £183.00 Concession £149.00 - 50 drawings in a day Course start date: Tue 1 Jul 2025 (and 8 other dates)
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Mario Lautier VellaA high energy programme of directed and self-directed drawing projects, with rapid shifts in materials, scale, subject and focus. Strictly no discards - come ready to play, risk, invent and discuss. For those with some drawing experience.Full fee £129.00 Senior fee £129.00 Concession £129.00 - Drawing in colour: summer school intensive Course start date: Tue 5 Aug 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Kim ScoullerExplore a variety of techniques and approaches to making a still-life in pastels. Learn how to mix pastels on paper, choose suitable materials and supports to allow you to create a finished pastel drawing.Full fee £279.00 Senior fee £223.00 Concession £181.00 - Draw, paint, print Course start date: Wed 30 Apr 2025 (and 2 other dates)
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Mary WintourOn this experimental course, you will draw, paint and print in often unfamiliar ways in order to catch the unexpected. Through experimentation and reflection, you will collate a personal collection of work. .Full fee £369.00 Senior fee £295.00 Concession £240.00 - City Lit contemporary collage projects 1Course start date: Thu 2 Oct 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
City Lit contemporary collage projects 1 initiates a year-long set of collage and mixed media projects designed to experiment with and examine the interplay between the two and three dimensions. You will work with a wide range of materials, on and off the wall, extending our pictorial practice into the realm of collage, painting, drawing, assemblage, bricolage, decoupage, photomontage, small scale constructions, printing and text within the context of mixed media.
Note* the course is designed in a way to enable students to either complete all three courses over the year or to come in at any stage in no particular order.Full fee £839.00 Senior fee £671.00 Concession £545.00 - Introduction to using a Sketchbook Course start date: Fri 10 Oct 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
A sketchbook is a great place to try things out, make mistakes and take risks - all in the nature of experimentation. An introduction to exploring creative mixed-media, drawing and mark-making techniques with confidence which can build personal ideas for further development.
Suitable for beginners as well as those with some previous drawing experience who would like to start using a sketchbook.Full fee £299.00 Senior fee £239.00 Concession £194.00 - Collage and mixed media: 3D approachesCourse start date: Thu 13 Nov 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Ruth FranklinAn exciting short, experimental course taking an adventure in collage to make 3D constructions from paper, amalgamating found materials and images to make exciting new sculptural forms.Full fee £339.00 Senior fee £271.00 Concession £220.00 - Portrait drawing: expression in the face Course start date: Thu 20 Nov 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
This short course will develop your existing knowledge and skills in drawing portraits to meet the challenge of creating expression. Bring your portrat drawing to life by exploring character, personality and emotion in the face of your subject, working from the life model.Full fee £159.00 Senior fee £127.00 Concession £103.00 - Collage and mixed media: book artsCourse start date: Thu 15 Jan 2026
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Ruth FranklinAn exciting short experimental course working with found books and individual book constructions to explore and combine a variety of creative techniques. Including collage, drawing, painting, mono-printing and paper as interventions into the pages of a book to create unexpectedly beautiful or powerful new work.Full fee £339.00 Senior fee £271.00 Concession £220.00 - Large-scale sketchbook Course start date: Fri 2 May 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Tony HullExplore the sequential and adaptive nature of large format sketchbook drawing as a site for generating personal material, inviting connections, and extracting patterns of meaning. Includes artist research, set-project as stimulus, and practical exploration of contemporary drawing techniques.Full fee £429.00 Senior fee £343.00 Concession £279.00
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