How to Draw Colombian Art

What You'll Need

• •Heavy watercolor paper or illustration board, graphite pencils, kneaded eraser, ruler, and fine drawing pens for the structural design and ornamental lines.
• •Watercolors, gouache, or acrylic paint in ivory, ochre, yellow, burnt umber, deep brown, emerald, blue-green, and near-black, plus metallic gold paint or metallic colored pencil.
• •A small round brush, a fine liner, a flat brush, and an old dry brush for filigree, stone texture, foliage, and worn gilding.
• •Gold leaf or imitation gold leaf with adhesive and protective varnish for a tactile traditional finish; use ventilation and follow the product instructions.
• •A digital painting program with layers, textured brushes, a soft airbrush, a multiply layer, an overlay or screen layer, and a perspective or symmetry guide.

Step by Step

1. 1

   1. Choose the subject and establish ceremonial frontality

   Begin with one dominant figure: a seated guardian, ritual vessel, standing protector, or mask-like personage. Place the head or central emblem on the vertical centerline and keep the shoulders, hands, ornaments, and major architectural shapes balanced around it. Use a nearly frontal viewpoint rather than a dramatic three-quarter pose; the stillness and symmetry should feel intentional, formal, and iconic. Leave a clear outer silhouette so the figure remains readable when surrounded by detail.

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   2. Build a strong value thumbnail

   Make three or four small thumbnails using only light, middle, and dark values. Reserve the largest dark mass for the background, recessed stone, or varnished wood, then place the brightest gold around the face, chest, hands, or ceremonial object. Add a pale atmospheric opening behind the figure to suggest highland light and distant mountains. If the figure disappears at thumbnail size, simplify the silhouette before adding ornament.

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   3. Construct the monumental stone guardian

   Draw the guardian as a combination of simple volumes: a broad block for the torso, wedges for the shoulders, cylinders or squared columns for the limbs, and a mask-like plane structure for the face. Keep the lower body heavy and stable, with a slightly enlarged base to suggest carved stone or a temple threshold. Indicate chisel planes with angular changes in value rather than many random cracks. Add a few vertical stains, softened edges, and moss-darkened recesses so the stone feels exposed to a wet tropical climate.

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   4. Design the gold figure and its filigree

   Sketch the gold areas as clear plates, pendants, breast ornaments, ear pieces, nose ornaments, or small animal and bird forms before filling them with detail. Inside each shape, use repeated curls, spirals, loops, bead chains, and tiny parallel arcs; keep the pattern denser near the edges and more open toward the center. Vary line thickness so the ornament does not look like a flat printed pattern: use dark hairline gaps between strands and brighter ridges on the raised metal. Let some filigree overlap the stone guardian, but preserve a few clean spaces for visual rest.

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   5. Paint the colonial gilt and dark varnish structure

   Lay in a deep brown, umber, or near-black ground around the main figure, then glaze transparent warm brown over selected areas to imitate aged varnish. Paint gold with a middle ochre first, a brighter yellow-gold on planes facing the light, and a small ivory or pale yellow highlight on the sharpest edges. Add green-brown oxidation, rubbed corners, and uneven darkening where gilding would be handled or exposed. Keep the darkest varnish beside the brightest gold; that adjacency creates the rich, devotional contrast associated with old gilt surfaces.

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   6. Create the tropical highland atmosphere

   Behind the guardian, layer distant blue-green mountains with low contrast and softened edges, then add a nearer slope or cloud bank with slightly stronger shapes. Use cool emerald, teal, and muted blue in the distance, reserving warmer ochres for the foreground gold and stone. Frame the composition with recognizable but simplified foliage such as broad leaves, heliconia-like forms, thin vines, or clustered palms; avoid making every leaf equally sharp. Add translucent mist between layers so the humid air separates the monumental foreground from the landscape.

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   7. Unify the palette and control the focal point

   Limit the finished palette to gold, dark brown, emerald, blue-green, stone gray, and small areas of cream or red-brown. Repeat emerald in the background, on a jewel, and in a few shadow reflections on the gold so the color feels designed rather than decorative. Increase contrast and edge sharpness around the face, central ornament, and hands; soften peripheral foliage and distant mountains. Check the image in grayscale and remove details that compete with the ceremonial center.

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   8. Add age, texture, and final accents

   Use a dry brush to break up broad stone planes, then add a few deliberate scratches, pores, hairline cracks, and patches of worn pigment. Place tiny gold glints only on the most important filigree intersections, not on every line. Add a subtle dark vignette or architectural frame to make the central figure feel enclosed and sacred, while keeping a narrow opening of mist or sky for depth. Finish with a protective varnish in traditional media, or a low-opacity texture and color-balance layer digitally, and compare the result with your original thumbnail.

Going Digital

Work from back to front: atmospheric mountains, mist, stone architecture, guardian, gold ornaments, then filigree and highlights. Use a textured charcoal or chalk brush for the underpainting, a hard-edged brush for carved planes, and a tiny pressure-sensitive brush for metal strands. Put dark varnish and transparent brown glazes on multiply layers, gold color on normal layers, and restrained warm highlights on screen or overlay layers; lower their opacity until the metal remains dimensional rather than neon. Use symmetry only for the construction phase, then introduce small asymmetries in wear, foliage, and ornament so the result feels handmade.

Common Mistakes

FAQ