Bruce Girrell on sat 19 dec 98
C.A. Sanger's response to Mel's post (The Great Need) was
One part particularly struck me, though, and that was at the very end:
> That, plus the small inner voice in my head, the
> twelve-year-old me, who prayed for someone, anyone, who would please
> teach me how to draw. No one ever did.
I felt very much the same way. I envied the kids who could draw, especially
the one who won a box of 64 Crayolas with the crayon sharpener in the box. I
just figured that some people knew how to draw and some didn't. I was one
who didn't.
A few years ago, I bought a book entitled "Drawing on the Right Side of the
Brain" by Betty Edwards (she has since written others). If you have not
learned to draw by other means, Get This Book! After trying only a few of
the exercises, I was *shocked* at how well I could draw. All it took was a
little instruction. Leaf through the book and look at some of her students'
before and after pictures. The time period between "before" and "after" is
usually a couple of months. The results are almost unbelievable.
Edwards teaches you how to draw what you see, not what you think that you
see. One of the things that she says is "Imagine if we taught children how
to read the way we teach them art. Put them in a room with a bunch of
reading materials and let them go at it. Read creatively! Read from the
heart! Don't worry about the rules, read what you feel!" (I took quite a bit
of liberty with the quote because I don't have the book here, but that is
the essence of it.) What a silly concept. Yet that is what we do with our
children when teaching art. "Here are the brushes and tempera. Draw
anything. Draw your favorite animal." No one ever provides the basics of
_how_ to draw. They talk about flowing compositions, balance and such, but
that assumes that you already know how to make an object that looks like a
cat or a tree or whatever.
For anyone who has ever prayed for someone to teach them to draw, Betty
Edwards has answered your prayers.
Bruce Girrell
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