Drawing Lessons for Beginners (or Those Who Just Gave Up)

Within everyone of us is an artist.  Unfortunately, by age ten that artist that was crazy about coloring and drawing pictures becomes frustrated and often gives up.  The left brain, what we focus on developing in our school systems, has begun to dominate everything we do.  The right brain, the side that is “right” for drawing has given way to the left.  The only problem is, the left brain isn’t any good at drawing.

At some point we decide what an eye looks like, or what a nose looks like.  That memory is what the left brain relys on to draw.  It isn’t interested in what it actually sees.  Only what it remembers.  The left brain uses a symbol-system developed in childhood for each drawing it creates.

The goal of the following drawing exercises is to allow the right brain an opportunity to emerge.  To develop a “shift” in thinking, from the left brain to the right.  To leave the symbol system behind and draw what you really see.

10 Drawing Lessons

Lesson 1: Optical Illusion Vase

Lesson 2: Fraggle Monster Vase

Lesson 3: Picasso’s The Dog

Lesson 4: Picasso’s The Butterfly

Lesson 5: Matisse’s La Pompadour

Lesson 6: Soda Pop Straws

Lesson 7: Does Negative Space Have a Shape? 

Lesson 8: Pure Contour Drawing

Lesson 9: Draw a Face

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