Gesture Drawings - Falling in love with a stick figure.

These are gesture drawings. I did 8 pages of these over the weekend. My first few were terrible because I did not understand the point of gesture drawings. I had an opportunity to see a lecture on gesture drawing by Vilppu. Vilppu explains things in a very plain language that is easy to understand. While I would not call my progress an instant success, I would say that I understand my intention when I do try to do gesture drawings much more clearly today than I did before I watched the video. I really want to get my hands on more of these lectures.

Mr. Vilppu touched base on how I think. Isn't it funny how information from one source breezes by you and around you and you think you understand its meaning? Then one day someone comes and presents that very same information and you suddenly experience the meaning. Everything you were told still holds true, but now you understand why or how it is true. In fact, now that you are experiencing the understanding, it helps you understand even better!

Oprah would say I have had an Aha! moment. Not only does Mr. Vilppu give me an understanding of what he is doing, but I suddenly understand what I am doing. Of course, that means that I will probably change the way I am doing things, but nonetheless, it is some very important information.

Suddenly, I am seeing and analyzing the gesture of my family members, my furniture, the vehicles parked in the driveway, the trees, the corn and anything that catches my eye. It is quite amazing how the brain does things like that. It will take information and make connections to many things. I don't know if everyone does this. I will apply an understood concept to everything until it is exhausted.

If there is an action - a gesture- in human forms, then there must be a gesture in any form. Suddenly my dog becomes very interesting to me even though he is just lying on the front porch sleeping. His head is swooshing that way and his back is continuing the swoosh to form a circle. His legs swoosh that way and his tail swooshes another way. There are swooshes all over my world. The trees swoosh. Had someone told me that gesture drawings were lots of swooshes I might have understood this a very long time ago.

I will be a student the rest of my life. If I learn to draw and paint well, that will simply be a by product of the process. If I learn to think better and grow, that will be the real prize. Every day I learn something new or practice what I have learned is a day well spent. It seems odd to treasure these silly little stick figures more than I treasure some of the drawings that I labored hours over. They aren't very pretty, but they represent a wonderful beginning. I am starting to get it!

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Art, art education, creative thinking, creativity, Drawing, Gesture drawing, sketch, sketchbook, sketching, Vilppu, visualization

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