Friday, December 19, 2008

I don't know how to draw.

Take a few minutes, first, to listen to this song from the brilliant [title of show] (NOT safe for work).



That verse about how you tried to draw Tippy the Turtle, but your fourth grade teacher said "You can't draw"? That was me, except it was third grade, and my drawing was of an Indian princess on a cliff at sunset, and my teacher said, "Clair, squint your eyes. That looks like a chicken!" (F--- you, Mrs. English. Why didn't you show me how to draw a headdress that didn't look like tailfeathers?)

Anyway, on my list of "Things I Might Try Next Year" is taking a drawing class. I have an image in my mind for a poster for Bell, Book & Candle, but no idea of how to put it on paper, and I'm not good at putting visual images into words.

What childhood talents of yours were squelched by discouragement from adults?

The one new book I read this week was FLASHBACK by Jenny Siler, a thriller about a young woman with retrograde amnesia who has some dangerous skills she doesn't remember learning. Good stuff.

I'll post the first half of my "best of 2008" reading list tomorrow...

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

I had an image for the poster of "Over The River and Through the Woods" that I couldn't draw or make even come close to my vision. I could decribe it well enough to someone so that they could....

RBo

Tom Ehrenfeld said...

Ah, but can you draw a boa constrictor digesting an elephant?

Anonymous said...

If you really want to give drawing a shot "The New Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain" by Betty Edwards is a must. Try it and you will be amazed. About $10 on Amazon.com

Anonymous said...

I had an eighth grade art teacher who seemed to simply assume that everyone could draw, but if your work sucked (as mine did), you got bad grades. I hated that woman.

Anna said...

I was a champion whistler until my piano teacher complained that it distracted the other kids when I whistled while waiting for my lesson to begin. Who would complain about an eight-year old whistling too much?! I was always in tune! I stopped whistling. Who knows what it could have led to :)

Anonymous said...

It always amazes me how so many art and music teachers who are supposed to nurture creativity seem instead to squash kids attempts to create and put down their work.

Although, in this case, I was just being an asshole (a trait that would stay with me my whole life):

In kindergarten, we were given mirrors and told to draw our faces on a paper plate. I drew a Ninja Turtle, and then insisted to my teacher that it was me, wearing a Ninja Turtle mask.

My high school art teacher was a bitch. She was no artist either, I'll say that much, and when any of us made anything better than her crap, she failed us for showing her up.

I'm much more creative since getting out of the education system. Luckily, it hasn't completely stifled my creativity. It sucks that I see it happening to my younger siblings though.