Beware of your STARTS-

Hi- Everyone- It is the end of 2022 and I have been taking time out in my life for reevaluating, self exploration, reading and trying to make sense of what life has given me and my place in it as a person and as an artist.  Much of what I have been reading oddly, had nothing to do with art. I am not sure of anything I have discovered or if it makes much difference yet. Like most things in life, experience and knowledge take time to be adsorbed and assimilated by the brain. 

Teaching the other day in my human anatomy class, I watched my students struggling to draw the model.  It struck me that no matter how many times I demonstrated drawing,  the message I was attempting to send was missing an important part in the drawing process. As a teacher, sometimes we forget the path we had to take to gain the ability we have acquired. 

When instructing anyone, we get so adsorbed in the technical aspects we lose sight of the art of the subject we are working on. I realized I was omitting my mental process from the equation of teaching while concentrating on the technicality of the subject.

When I draw anything, and this applies to painting as well, but for now, I will address only drawing, I never go straight into a subject when I start.  I move my hand around in front of the pad, looking for the image to formulate in my head first, looking for a point to place my pencil, or charcoal, lightly onto the paper. This results in making several light strokes. I do this process from years of repetition, I did not notice this part of drawing was not translating to my students, who would immediately begin to create without this mental process. Their START would determine their progress. They would move from there and continue never thinking possibly their start might not be right or could be accurate. What I do in my head, was not translated by me to them. As a result their drawings were not well constructed and turned out inaccurately and didn’t “say anything” about them or the work. It was a simple thing to correct.   But when thinking only about teaching, I overlooked the mental machinations that needed to happen before and during the drawing process. Which I did not think to convey because it is second nature to me. 

Without this mental idea of the subject and how to interpret  it; what methods to use, the young artist places marks on their paper and never thinks to alter or adjust or correct those marks. Their thinking is to geared to move forward in getting to the end. To complete the image. To draw what they see in their minds. And not what might be correct, accurate or even what is in front of them. Drawing is not only about making marks, but making the correct marks in the right place. How many of you have hung a picture on a wall? You stand a distance from the wall, sometimes hold up the picture to see where to hang it, moving your arms. Even when you think you have the right place, you place it at the wall. Before driving in the nail you make micro adjustments. Then you hammer in the nail.

Drawing is about marks that contain thickness and thinness, shape, light and dark, long and/ or short and angles. Starting points and stopping points. 

Rarely is the first mark sure, it will require alteration. It could be slight, maybe darkened or maybe shortened or need more curvature. Lines have a higherarchy. Some lines are more important than other lines. The kind of line you use is a dialogue. It tells the viewer clearly more about the whole. 

A heavy thick line may indicate force or accent differently than a thin wispy line. A line that starts thin and ends thick may imply direction. Forward or backward movement.

A curved line shows grace while a straight line rigidity. Where a line starts and ends is important. Space between lines should tell us something. And absence of lines indicates openness, space. All lines should have a reason for being, variation and not indiscriminately placed. And all lines happen in the brain first then translate to the paper. Lines can trail off, be interrupted by opposing lines. Some lines disappear then reappear again. The best drawings contain a wide variety of lines, judiciously used.

It all depends on what you are trying to convey. How well is your ‘line’ vocabulary?