How to Draw Icon Art

What You'll Need

• •Traditional: a rigid wood panel or heavy watercolor board, rabbit-skin or acrylic gesso, fine sandpaper, and a soft round brush for building a smooth ground.
• •Traditional: imitation gold leaf or metallic gold paint, gilding adhesive, a soft mop brush, and a clean cotton cloth for creating and burnishing the luminous background.
• •Traditional: egg tempera or gouache in ochres, iron reds, muted blues, ivory, umber, and carbon black, plus fine liner brushes for contours and hatching.
• •Traditional: graphite or red chalk, tracing paper, a ruler, and a pointed stylus for transferring a measured, symmetrical design.
• •Digital: a painting application with layers, vector or shape tools, textured brushes, clipping masks, and adjustable opacity, such as Krita, Procreate, Photoshop, or Affinity Photo.
• •Digital: a tablet or mouse, a scanned paper or gesso texture, and a small library of metallic, dry-brush, grain, and scratch brushes.

Step by Step

1. 1

   1. Choose the subject and establish the format

   Select one central figure or a small, balanced group, and decide what symbolic objects, gestures, or colors communicate the subject. Use a vertical panel or canvas with generous margins, since the surrounding gold ground is part of the composition. Make a thumbnail using only flat shapes: head, shoulders, hands, garment masses, halo, and major background divisions. Keep the pose frontal or nearly frontal, with the gaze directed outward to create the calm, ceremonial presence associated with the style.

2. 2

   2. Build a smooth gesso-like surface

   For a traditional piece, apply several thin coats of gesso to a rigid panel, allowing each coat to dry before sanding it smooth. Remove dust between coats and aim for a surface that feels hard and lightly absorbent rather than chalky and loose. For paper, use a sealed board or apply a thin acrylic ground instead of over-wetting the sheet. Digitally, place a warm off-white gesso texture on the bottom layer and reduce its opacity until it subtly breaks up perfectly flat color.

3. 3

   3. Transfer a symmetrical construction drawing

   Draw a vertical centerline and use it to measure the eye line, shoulder width, hand positions, and halo diameter. Make the figure elongated by extending the neck, torso, and fingers slightly beyond realistic proportions, but keep the gesture stable and dignified. Transfer the design with graphite, red chalk, or a light digital sketch layer, then simplify small anatomical details into clean planes. Check the silhouette at a distance before committing to paint.

4. 4

   4. Create the luminous gold ground

   Paint or gild the background before the figure, leaving the transferred design visible where possible. Apply metallic gold in thin, even passes, then vary the surface with gentle rubbing, translucent ochre washes, or small irregular areas of darker gold so it does not look like a flat yellow rectangle. Leave a clean reserve around the figure and halo, or carefully paint around them after the main ground dries. In a digital file, combine a warm gold gradient, a fine metallic texture, and low-opacity cloudy stains rather than relying on a single bright gold fill.

5. 5

   5. Block in the figure with restrained color families

   Begin with broad, opaque shapes for the face, hair, hands, undergarment, and outer robe, using muted reds, blue-greens, creams, and earth colors. Keep the palette narrow and repeat important colors in small areas so the image feels unified. Establish the light side of the face and hands with a warm middle tone before adding highlights; do not start with pure white. Leave the dark contour drawing for later, but preserve enough separation between neighboring shapes that the figure remains legible.

6. 6

   6. Model the face, hands, and elongated anatomy

   Build the face with simplified planes: a warm base, a darker tone beneath the brow and nose, a narrow shadow along the cheek or jaw, and carefully placed light on the forehead, nose bridge, cheekbones, and fingers. Keep the eyes level and relatively still, because small shifts can weaken the frontal symmetry. Use thin layers rather than blended realism, allowing each plane to remain visible. Add only a few precise lines for eyelids, nostrils, lips, knuckles, and hair so the expression stays solemn rather than theatrical.

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   7. Paint drapery and its hatched highlights

   First design the garment as large angular folds that follow the weight and direction of the body; avoid filling every area with random wrinkles. Add a darker fold channel, a middle local color, and narrow warm highlights on the planes facing the light. Reinforce highlights with short, parallel hatch marks that follow the fold direction, spacing them more closely in shadow transitions and more widely on broad light planes. Keep the hatching deliberate and visible, using a smaller brush or textured digital pencil instead of soft airbrushing.

8. 8

   8. Add the halo, contours, and symbolic details

   Construct the halo as a measured circle, oval, or geometric field centered behind the head, then decorate it with restrained rays, bands, dots, or meaningful motifs. Paint dark linear contours around the silhouette and selected internal divisions, varying thickness so the image does not look mechanically outlined. Place symbolic objects, inscriptions, gestures, or color accents only after the main figure is stable, and make sure each one supports the subject rather than competing with the face. Keep the darkest marks near focal features, hands, and important edges.

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   9. Finish with patina and controlled corrections

   Unify the surface with a thin translucent veil of warm umber, ochre, or gray-green, applying it unevenly so the work suggests age without becoming dirty. Add a few restrained scratches, softened edges, tiny abrasions, and darker deposits near panel boundaries, but protect the face, hands, and key symbols from excessive distressing. Correct any weak symmetry, muddy color, or accidental tangent with opaque paint before the final glaze. Let the piece rest, then inspect it both close up and at thumbnail size to confirm that the gold ground, frontal figure, halo, and contours still read clearly.

Going Digital

Work in a layered file: sketch and symmetry guides at the top, figure flats beneath, shadows and highlights clipped to each color shape, and gold ground and texture at the bottom. Use a hard-edged brush for planes and contours, a dry or chalk brush for gesso grain, and a low-opacity textured brush for translucent tempera-like buildup. Create the halo with vector circles or selection tools so it stays centered, then distress it with masked grain rather than erasing randomly. To imitate egg tempera, stack many low-opacity strokes, keep edges slightly visible, and apply a final warm glaze layer set to low opacity or a gentle color mode.

Common Mistakes

FAQ