Hello Biddy. The official spelling is /Marise/ - (rhymes with /Deniise/). My user name is Marryhs. Many years ago I toyed with a total revamp of my given name and my username is one of a number of experiments.
I mostly work in graphite, and thus far mostly portraiture. I have enjoyed a series of baby’s faces with white charcoal on grey paper. Surely the easiest way to create a good drawing of these young faces. I am easily frustrated with pastels and at present am not experimenting with gouache as I do not have either a work room or a convenient wet room where I can keep materials and works in progress. Not that it matters much as I live alone.
I am 67 years old and do have some friends who are in their late 70s; even one or two who are 80+. I find age is not a barrier to friendship, though I cringe at the thought of being socially confined to those in the retirement bracket. I suspect that is the prejudice of one who works with school children.
My sister lives in Virginia - she is the primary connection to my Mum because of her relative closeness - and I have nieces in Elizabeth as well as places south of Adelaide City. But you are correct regarding the possibility of meeting at some stage, not least because my visits to SA are often circumscribed by the cost of accommodation and the sense that my companion needs to be overseeing his home affairs. I currently subscribe only to Matt Fussell’s sjte, but I love Jay Lee’s work, and watch Kara Bullock. Kara’s site would be good to subscribe to if I wanted to work more on portraiture. She works with quite a number of artists whose instruction is available through her web site.
I shall check out Domestika as Illustrating is a skill I am interested in.
Thanks again for your notes
Be well and painterly
Marise
Hello everyone. After an extended time away I just wanted to hope all are doing well. The Coronavirus has definitely altered space and time. I am attempting to throw myself back into drawing… I was doing portraits for awhile though personal issues deterred my progress.
I am focusing on the secrets of drawing… I found I know very little about shapes, perspectives etc. I hope this course builds my insight and foundation.
Hi my name is Monica I am from Romania butt I live and work in UK,I always wanted to do art until now I was trying my best on my own without a teacher.I am please to find this affordable online course for aspirants like me.
Thank you Matt!
Hi this Asim Here. I am from Pakistan and love doing any kind of Art. I will be sharing my work here. see ya
Welcome aboard Asim.
Hello everybody. My name is Charles and I’m a beginning artist that joined this website to learn about the fundamentals of art. So many accomplished artists say “learn the fundamentals” but won’t tell you what the fundamentals are or where to go to learn them. I’m glad that I finally found this place. Great teaching, a curriculum, a wide variety of mediums, and an active community. Very difficult to find all of those combinations in one place.
I’m Looking forward to starting my art journey here with all of you. Now, back to “The Secrets of Drawing.”
Thanks sterlingsiam…
Great to be with this group. I am Albertine, live in The Netherlands,. Several times I made a little time for my love to be active with colours, a few years ago I discovered soft pastel. With the Corona around it gave me real time to get serious. The live course stopped in March and than I discovered Matt. I started with animals in pastel, the cat is my first one; also I do the course 25 days to improve my drawing
Comments from the group members help me very much to give me some confidence. Thank you for s haring my passion
Dear All,
I’m Vidhi aka Forgetmenot73. Art is my passion, which I never had the chance to pursue until recently when my daughter introduced me to a coloring app and my husband gifted the iPad and pencil. I instantly fell in love with the idea of coloring again without a huge setup. But I wanted to draw not just color so I started drawing over random templates that the app offered. It’s been a year now and I’ve made progress leaps and bounds just by self-teaching. However slowly I got the urge to plunge into the real deal of using paints, pen, pencil and paper. So finally I picked up the courage to take lessons and learn the basics and enhance my understanding of different techniques and organic modes of art. And that brings me to Matt’s TheVirtualInstructor lessons and to this community. Seeing so many beautiful artworks by talented artist here I hope to learn something that I can hold to look at. I’m excited to start this journey. Thank you 
Hi every body, 
My name is Sara , I’m from Iran and love do drawing .
I do like learning more about drawing with pencil .How to shade, to know about dark and light value . I’m happy to found this place .
I found this community by searching about foundation drawing , I’m a beginner, I do self taught drawing , with all of source I could find at internet and YouTube . I hope with help everybody I can correct my mistake and learning better about art of drawing ,
PS: sorry for bad grammar,English is not my native language.
Nice to meet you all . 
Sara
Hi everyone mi name is Lucia I’am from Panamá, 19 years old and a Med student. I’am in love with science but I also have a secret passion for art, I’am currently learning pencil drawing in the time off that I have from studying and I love it.
Sending all of you good wishes and also here is my first drawing 
Love it - especially the reflection of the window!
Hello, I’m Jody. I recently joined and have already gained so much information on this site. Looking forward to correcting art habits I may have acquired in the past that are not working for me and will help improve my art in the future. I’m very impressed with the lessons, live demonstrations and helpful articles.
I am a retired airline employee after 42 years, parent of a fabulous 34 year old son, wife of the true “southern gentleman” and advocate for improving my artistic ability (?). Originally, my favorite medium was watercolor and oil, but I have been experimenting with colored pencils and love the results.
This appears to be a very active, helpful site and I am looking forward to learning from you all.
Hi Everyone,
My name is Becky and I‘m from the Boston area. I just joined a few weeks ago. I have been drawing on and off in graphite for the past year and decided to join the VI to help expand my skills beyond adult ed courses, and to try out colored pencil. Matt was wicked nice to critique a drawing I submitted last week! Looking forward to engaging in feedback/critique with all of you.
Hello Everyone, I am a Newbie at all of this. I am just trying things to get started. Essentially having a look around to see what is what. My name is Darlene Gillet but my friends call me Duckie. I learned to draw late in life, and I am trying to it in the best way I know how. I have tried everything from drawing, charcoals, graphites, pastels, watercolours, etc. I would like to think that the world is my oyster. If you have any words of wisdom I would greatly appreciate it.
Hello! My name is Gwen Prettyman. I have loved to draw with graphite since I was a child, but have never taken any formal art class. I began following The Virtual Instructor about 2 years ago and hope to find more time to grow as an artist. I look forward to taking a passion to new levels!
Ok,words of wisdom: i also started very late in life and as you did tried every medium my most recent brush pens . Sometimes im pleasantly surprised ,sometimes not . But its fun and there is so many nice helpful artists just like me here. im in this community 2 or 3 years now .
welcome tom
i love pencil work too and this is a nice lesson for me. You haven’t missed a thing here,the stroke direction, contrast, and the amazing reflection of the window . thanks for posting tom
Thank You Tom, I appreciate your response. It is nice to know that I am not the only one that has started all this later in life. When I see what some of the young people can do it makes me think how can I do this, but I do enjoy it. Thanks again, Duckie