poliphilo: (Default)
poliphilo ([personal profile] poliphilo) wrote2023-12-27 10:23 am

Progress Report

 I can write up to a standard that satisfies me and I can take photographs ditto but I can only draw a bit- which is the same as drawing badly. The first page of my new sketchbook makes me want to spew. It's self-conscious,  halting,  amateurish. I'm trying to draw "well" and I don't have the ability.  "So," I thought, "I can't go on like this, hating my doodles and hating myself, let's try another tack....

One way would be to take a course and learn to draw like Raphael- only I don't want to draw like Raphael- and besides I'm doing this for fun; I don't want to have to work at it.

Or I could  stop trying to draw "properly"- and try drawing like a child."

So I had a go at that, but the effort was still visible, also the falling short- and I still wanted to spew- so I went one step further...

And tried drawing blind, on the principle of pinning the tail on the donkey, not looking at the scribble until it was finished and....

Well, I don't expect anyone else to like them but I'm pleased with my scratchy little scrawls. I'm not aiming at a certain result so I can't be disappointed. Instead I'm surprised every time. Who knew it would come out like that? Also there's a dynamism I never came close to achieving when I was trying to draw well....

So I take a subject, I look away from the paper, maybe watch something on YouTube, and start pegging away...

I'm enjoying myself and it's keeping me off the phone

Here's Jean-Leon Gerome's picture of Napoleon and the Sphinx




And here's mine: