Can't Draw, Won't Draw

Many of us appreciate what a fantastic asset being able to draw cartoons could be in the work we do. We'd be able to pep up our presentations. We could trim off the excess fat in our communications and get to the point more easily. Cartoons could help us make everything we say, or write, more appealing to its potential audience. In short, being able to draw cartoons could help us get our message across much more effectively.

Why is it then that despite these considerable potential benefits, most of us spend our adult lives trapped in the mistaken belief that drawing is something we'll never be able to do because we have absolutely no talent for it?

I've spent many years teaching people how to use cartoon drawing in the work they do and I wish I had a penny for every time someone has announced with utter conviction at the outset that there's absolutely no way I'd ever be able to teach them to draw!

Some people become visibly upset and stubbornly dig in their heels when I talk about the ability to draw being hardwired into all of us – even them. They're absolutely certain that it would take nothing short of a miracle for them to be able to stand in front of an audience and draw something on a flipchart.

Maybe you see yourself as hopeless case too? Well, let's imagine that you go to bed tonight a drawing illiterate but wake up tomorrow morning being able to draw. Now, miraculously, you can confidently put pen to paper and draw things that other people easily recognise and identify. What you intended is what other people see, and it all happens in an instant.

In my experience, people who say they can't draw usually imagine that this is what being able to draw is like.

In this model of drawing – from which they feel forever excluded – the image begins life, fully formed, inside the drawer's head. It then makes a journey from inside the brain to the tip of the pencil by way of the arm and the hand. The whole process culminates in the magical dance of the pencil on the paper's surface as it faithfully transfers the contents of the drawer's imagination onto the blank page. Job done!

So what’s wrong with this view of drawing? After all, if you were to ask a professional cartoonist to draw something, they would probably begin moving the magical pencil tip immediately and your requested image would start appearing almost instantaneously.

But do you imagine, when you watch Olympic gymnasts performing their feats of physical prowess, that what you see is all there is to it? Are there some people who can just flick a switch and do it, and others who can't? No, we understand that their amazing displays are the climax of a long, slow learning curve that had its origins in their first tentative steps as toddlers.

My point is that even though the Olympic gymnast's routine looks effortless we never lose sight of the realisation that it must have been hard-won, taking years of disciplined practice and hard work to achieve. As we watch their near-faultless performance we are never tempted to conclude that what see in front of us is the whole story of how they reached this level of accomplishment.

The problem with watching experts do their thing is that they are so good at what they do. All the endless hours of practice, mistakes, false starts, dead ends, rough edges and hard work that makes what they do possible, are masked by the surface sheen of their expertise.

Usually we are fully aware of this hidden process whether we're watching a professional tennis player or listening to a violinist playing a concerto by Mozart. How odd then that so many of us overlook it when we watch someone draw a picture. We tend to think that people have either got it or they haven’t, and that people who can draw must have been born with a special talent for it.

An understanding of the process of learning to draw based on what people actually do, is enabling. It begins with mark making. Our brains have evolved to resolve chaos and impose meaning on it. Even the most random of marks, or scribbles, will start to look like something if you relax and give it some time.

It's like seeing pictures in the fire or faces in clouds. For Leonardo Da Vinci it was a mossy wall onto which his visual imagination projected landscapes, battle scenes and all manner of things. Over time, and with plenty of practice, it's possible to build up a repertoire of remembered objects, figures and expressions. Gradually, this experience enables us to produce certain remembered, and practised, images on demand.

Of course, there's more to it than this but, in essence, this is the underlying process that the polished actions of the experienced professional hide. Misconceptions block our progress in life. They give rise to superstitions, false ideas and self-limiting beliefs that prevent us realising our full potential. Watching someone draw well reveals nothing of the varied learning process that has led up to the finished drawing, and can easily put people off trying to draw for themselves. Whereas a glimpse beneath the surface reveals a familiar learning journey of trial and error that offers hope to us all, and a real way forward.

© 2006 Martin Shovel CreativityWorks


© 2006 CreativityWorks. All rights reserved. You are free to use material from the this newsletter so long as you include complete attribution, including live web site link. Please also notify us where the material will appear. The attribution should read:

"By Martin Shovel of CreativityWorks. Please visit CreativityWorks website at www.creativityworks.net to find out more about advanced presentation skills courses and coaching." (Please ensure that the link is live if placed in an eZine or on a website.)