Artist drawings with pencil

Pencil portrait drawings, as an art form, have a rich and fascinating history. The use of graphite in artistic creation, initially inserted in a porte-crayon (or “pencil holder”), emerged in the 17th century. During that period and much of the 18th century, graphite was primarily employed for preliminary sketches to be completed in other media.

Fully finished graphite drawings were a rarity.

By the late 18th century, the precursor to the modern pencil was developed: a rod of natural graphite fitted into a wooden cylinder.

Artist drawings with pencil

The true revolution in pencil making came in 1795, when the French inventor Nicolas-Jacques Conté devised a method of producing pencil rods from a mixture of graphite and clay. This innovation gave rise to the modern graphite pencil, which quickly gained popularity among 19th-century artists.

These high-quality graphite pencils enabled artists to use pencils not just for sketches but also for detailed and finished drawings.

However, the tradition of portraiture i