Before gaining renown for his iconic series of woodblock prints of the Great Wave off Kanagawa, Katsushika Hokusai (่้ฃพ ๅๆ) published three comprehensive volumes of “Quick Lessons in Simplified Drawing,” which are really fun to browse and remarkably build figures from the same rudimentary figures that all art teachers seem to employ, with the first book breaking every conceivable subject into geometric shapes, the second book fragmenting their curves and contours and the third book diagramming stroke order. Much more from Kottke at the link above.