Visual arts for me is, and will always be, more than just creating pretty pictures
It is about understanding
Of course understanding the world in a visual sense, locating the key foundational visual elements to create evocative paintings and drawings
These are all gifts that come from painting to be sure
There is one gift which ended up being the most valuable though
And that is:
The clearer I get in drawing/painting, even technical understanding, the clearer I get in understanding myself.
With unwrapping this gift comes insight
-into the rules or principles surrounding visual art
-seeing the world outside of symbols or narrative
-How much, or little, I flavour what it is I see with my own personal experience
-and what all of these gifts say about me as a person, whether that is rooted in my fears or desires
Esoterically this is all well and good, but how do the inner mechanics of learning about myself through learning to paint/draw manifest?
It has all come about through creating a distinction between the “right” and the “wrong” way of doing things in painting
Designing rules or boundaries, sometimes consciously but more often than not subconsciously
Using these rules to fence in my attention and effort among the infinite amount of information
And
Eventually breaking, bending, or redefining those rules,distinctions, or boundaries
this becomes the unwrapping process that fosters insight
There has long been a distinction in me
Whether it is something I keep from others, ashamed or frightened of how they will judge me
Or
A mighty psalm that I hold at the ready, to proselytize from a soap box mountain top bringing lost souls into the flock in order to illustrate the error of their ways
The distinction is as follows:
Drawing and painting from life
(Being in front of the subject/object that you wish to paint or draw)
Is greater than
Drawing and painting from photograph
(Having a photograph of what it is you wish to paint or draw)
As an artist, regardless of how long you have considered yourself so or the perceived level you put yourself at, have you experienced this distinction or felt it looming over you?
In my artistic life the boundaries of creating from life as the source for inspiration being more valuable than creating from photograph has changed multiple times
As well as the importance I place on it
And feel grateful to currently be in a place where the distinction has very little importance
Being present and noticing the
boundaries of dichotomy
Has overtaken the old photograph vs life debate
Now before you get too fired up or, ashamed, or whatever else let me just go ahead on record and say that at no time in my entire life have I not used a photograph as reference or to help me understand 😁
what it is I am looking at
let me call attention to two phrases that I just mentioned that are the key in understanding what I am speaking of:
1) “Boundaries of dichotomy”-the line of division between any two things
2) “What it is I am looking at”-Looking verses Seeing
click here ⬆️
Let’s continue
The humble beginnings of understanding painting/ drawing started with
what it wasn’t
Drawing from life meant that I wasn’t using photographs
I realize that this was learned behaviour, at some point I read or heard that using photographs was not a good way to learn how to draw/paint
Holding on to this opinion for many years was valuable as I do think it is important to learn to draw/paint from life
It kept blinders on me and I was able to focus on the task of drawing/painting without veering off course
And
The skill set of being able to take in and compartmentalize the vast amount of three dimensional visual information into simplified two dimensional shapes has been invaluable in so many ways
Outside of the technical reasoning behind drawing from life vs photograph a change began to occur in my thought process
Sri Ramana Maharishi talks about the Neti-Neti form of meditation, where the practitioner uses self inquiry to discover what/where the self is. It is a way of clearing out all of the physical and mental information and stimuli that might be confused with the actual self. Neti-Neti is translated roughly to not this-not that. The practitioner slowly begins to scan the body and mind in search of the self or “atman” and every new sensation or thought that arises is met with Neti-Neti.
Originally drawing from life felt very much like this
Neti-Neti
Not this-Not that
Which caused the thought process in my own mind
if drawing from life is not using a photograph what is it?
The transition of “Drawing from Life” as not drawing from a photograph
into
“Drawing from Life” means being in close proximity to the object or subject, whether that be a life model or still life set up,
was a crucial step in unwrapping my gift
Think about that statement
Drawing from life means I am in close physical proximity to the object or subject
Photos themselves outside of the images they show, whether on the phone or paper, are objects, which may very well turn into subjects, that I am in close physical proximity to.
Viewing the photo, say on paper, as an artifact that I am drawing instead of drawing the image printed on the paper are two very different drawings.
Not so much in the final product but in how the the act of drawing takes place internally
This little switch in thinking allowed the inclusion of photographs into my practice
They after all are objects that I am indeed in physical proximity to
the definition of painting or drawing from life had changed
No more was the definition tied to the physicalities of technique
Or an ethical debate on what I had used to get to the final image
Over time
Day by day
working through line and shape
My definition on drawing from life became:
How I was viewing the world around me
And just like that by having the definition change
So did my boundaries
Remember the statement I made note of:
Boundaries of dichotomy-the line of division between any two things
What is a drawing?
Boundaries of pencil and charcoal
The very act of studying from life forces us to study life with boundaries!
How it is made up
How we make it up
and
Which is which
When we look out into the world whether at a landscape, still life, or model
We are seeing separate items
Different people
The expansion of boundaries to become more inclusive of what I was “allowed” to do eventually began to thin and fade in parts
Looking out into a forest with rigid and defined boundaries I might find trees
The more those boundaries thin the less I am looking at trees and the more I am seeing shapes
Untill the boundary thins to reveal
One
shape
So much of drawing from life equates to the specific way in which I am taking in visual information.
It is impossible to live and act in a world with no dichotomy
Boundaries are a must
As long as there is someone who is drawing/painting
There is a separation between the artist and their work
The artist and what inspires them
Today I realize that the gift is not my recognition of these boundaries
Or even
Recognizing that I have created the boundaries of dichotomy
For
In order for me to look and experience the world
There must be
Me
and
everything else