"I Can't Draw"
“I can’t draw.” What a devastating notion, “I can’t draw,” I mean come on, cavemen could draw. You can draw. And if it’s up to me, you WILL draw.
Ok, let’s put “I can’t draw” aside, and move on to an even sadder notion, “I used to draw but gave it up as a kid.” That right there is my own personal, “for sale, baby shoes, never worn.” Seriously, hearing people say these things always makes my heart sink, and goddammit, a heart should float.
It is true though, that these days, our hearts are struggling with buoyancy. The world at our fingertips is chaotic and tragic. We have no clarity. We have no control. We wake up and five years have passed. Where did that time go? What have I been doing? It is dismaying, disorienting. Nothing makes sense. Time doesn’t make sense. All the clocks are wrong. And calendars… what a joke. Calendars were invented by the calendar industry to sell animal-themed calendars.
But look, I want to help. If you’re that kid who used to draw, or someone who has yearned to make drawings but is intimidated, or if you’re a professional looking to cross-pollinate your creativity into another field, or if you’re bored, or depressed, or an administrative assistant, or an intern, or between jobs, or a tugboat captain… if you’re a person or caveman, I want to help.
But how?
I have designed portable exercises based on the most important lessons of my creative drawing life. Seriously, they are quick, five minutes long max. You could do them on your commute, or with your oatmeal, really just about anywhere.
These exercises are sequenced as to encourage gradual growth and reflection. The goal is to cultivate a way of seeing and a way of positioning yourself in the world. The hope is for continual, sustainable growth.
We aren’t looking for the get-happy-quick scheme of content sharing (SPOILER: it doesn’t make you happy.) We don’t want that easy IG post, we don’t want a reel (SPOILER: I still don’t know what that is.) I want to help you cultivate a sense of creative continuity free from the data-mined hellscape of social media. Drawing one day at a time.
So will you draw with me?
Yes? Ok, here’s the day one assignment. Grab a scrap of paper. Grab whatever makes a mark. (We’ll talk about materials in the next post) AND… here it is…
THE EXERCISE:
DO THE WORST DRAWING YOU CAN POSSIBLY DO.
THE DURATION:
5 mins.
THE TOOLS:
Pen, pencil, charcoal, paper, whatever, just do it and do it badly!
THE LESSON:
This is an exercise I do when warming up in the morning. It helps me forget about the outcome. To accept all the possibilities of the blank page. To move forward without feeling burdened by expectations of what a drawing should or should not look like. It helps me trust my line. It will help you too. And… I love a bad drawing.
Ballpoint pens have been good to me over the past year for freeing up drawing. I like to scribble. And scribble and scribble. Furiously and freely, or colouring things in. It feels like a child-like energy. Or adolescent compulsive doodler in the margins of exercise books energy. They don’t run out like pen and ink or wear down like crayons. You can just go.
Okay, you're on. I'm in the middle of a "drawing crisis" that a caveman just wouldn't understand. I had an exhibit three years ago that was the biggest thing I'd ever done, and I was drawing and painting like nobody's business. Then some life things happened that threw me out of the saddle, and I've been struggling to get back on the horse ever since. I'm "supposed to be" working on a graphic memoir. The pressure. Every time I try to draw I run away screaming. Right now I'm reading lots of Lynda Barry and also Betty Edward's Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain to try and convince myself to chill out. Someone else recently suggested doing a "bad drawing", so okay, I'll do it.
Also, you owe me some art, haha. I won an "original ink drawing" last September 2024 but I never saw hide nor hair of it. Maybe my Canadian address scared you off. I'd still love to have it!