What would happen if I drew random shapes with markers and tried to turn them into things? What would happen if I didn’t plan my composition first and went straight into drawing with ink? What would happen if I used pastel over watercolour? What would happen if I used crayons instead of pencils? What would happen if I did something different to what I normally do?
As a kid, ‘what would happen if…’ ruled my world. What would happen if I climbed this tree? What would happen if I went downhill on this skateboard on my stomach? What would happen if I jumped in this puddle? What would happen if I tried not to eat my vegetables?
The results of this approach were anything but safe. I never broke an arm, but I came close. I ended up with plenty of bruises but I never died. Questions that began with ‘what would happen if’ were the easiest way to test my limits.
Over the last couple of weeks, I’ve been drawing almost everyday. Not in a sketchbook, like I’m used to, but digitally. I’ve never felt that drawing digitally was drawing at all, it often felt like a different thing. But now, I’m finding that whilst it does feel different; it’s doing the same thing to my brain. The more I draw, the more I write. The more I write, the more ideas I generate. The more ideas I generate, the more I need to visualise them – it’s a self-fuelling loop and one that is nourished by the same activity of drawing whether using traditional or digital techniques.
On the way to our favourite local coffee shop, an old cypriot man lived in a garden full of fruit trees – lemons, cumquats, and oranges. His name was Ioannis (pronounced Yannis).
Whenever we passed Ioannis and he was in his front garden (either having a smoke or tending to the trees) we’d have a short chat. Depending on the time of year, he’d offer us some lemons, “These are sweet, you can eat them like fruit,” he’d say. They weren’t sweet, of course, they were just a different type of lemon called Meyer, but his optimism was lovely.
One particular morning, sunny but cool in that very Melbourne way, Ioannis was talking to me about his joy of gardening.
As we got to know Ioannis more, we learned that he had only recently lost his wife of 40 years, but still got up every day for his fruit trees, coffee, and always with a smile. Occassionally, we’d see him at the local market or out and about in the community – buying a new plant from the nursery or having a coffee with friends.
Shortly after this conversation with Ioannis, we stopped bumping in to him. I just assumed it was serendipity – I changed my regular coffee routine, he changed his. But then, a few weeks later, we walked past his house to find a “For Auction” sign attached to his wall – it’s not likely he went to a nursing home.
I still walk passed Ioannis’ now-sold house. The new people haven’t moved in yet so his fruit trees are still there and laden with fruit – I’ll be surprised if it stays this way. But, no matter what happens to that house on the corner, it’s likely I’ll always remember that if I’ve got some fruit trees, good coffee, and a smile, I’ll live a happy life.
My experience so far shows that Ioannis is on to something. Now, it’s time to plant my fig and lemon trees in the the front garden.
How do others do it? That’s what we want to know. We look across social media feeds and portfolios. We see work that amazes us, inspires us, and intrigues us, and what we want to know is – how do they do it?
Some people seem to produce a lot; where do they get the time? Some people produce colours that seem difficult to make; what materials are they using? Some people produce things at a scale, either large or small, that seems impossible; how does that work? Where did they get that idea? How did they discover that approach? How do others do it?
But, in discovering how others do things, we often find that there is no magic secret. It turns out that those who seem to produce a lot don’t have children so they have more time than others. People who produce things at an impossible scale, either large or small, are just using magnifying glasses or projectors. People using ‘unusual’ materials, as it turns out, often results from having those particular materials on hand – unusual for others, common for them.
If one learns anything from watching others do stuff it’s that there is no one right way to do anything, there is no ‘secret’. What one learns is that others just do it their way, and perhaps that’s the best advice of all?
Content is not art. Content is a category invented by (mostly) social media platforms who would like us to make stuff that engages people long enough on their platform to sell advertising to. Content is about feeding a machine of views, likes, and shares in the hope that, in return, the content creator gets rewarded – with an audience, with some ad revenue, with a sponsorship deal. Content is abstract, generic, unimportant. Content takes from the soul, it doesn’t feed it.
Art is not content. Art is something that no company invented. Art doesn’t have a market-purpose. Art is self-expression – using tools in the physical world to help us understand more about ourselves for no one else’s benefit but our own. Occasionally, that expression and exploration benefits others – mostly people searching for answers to the same questions as the artist. Occassionally, because of that connection, art sometimes generates money. But money is not the point of art. Art feeds the soul, and the souls of others. It doesn’t take, it gives.
Neither is right or wrong, it’s just worth reminding oneself occasionally – which one am I actually creating? Which one do I spend more of my time creating?
As an exercise in conceptual thinking, I’ve been practicing editorial illustration by illustrating my journal. I decided to start at the latest one and work my backwards through everything I’ve written whilst adding an image to every new entry. It started as an experiment but has now turned into a hobby.
The strange thing is that as I’m finding pictures to represent the ideas in my writing I’m finding that I want to change my writing – mostly because the title doesn’t really capture the idea of the article (but it seemed to be fine at the time I was writing).
I’ve long gone on about the relationship between words and pictures – especially in picture books where the relationship is at its strongest. Words create and change pictures and pictures create and change words.
It’s easy (and probably common?) to think that writing and drawing are two separate activities but it seems that I get better clarity of thought if I do both. Perhaps a better way to work is write some words, draw some pictures, then re-write the words. Pictures, it seems, help to clarify my thinking in a way that working in only words does not.
When I’m at the beach, it doesn’t take me very long to re-discover how little I need to restore my energy and focus. These occasional reminders are important to have semi-regularly. Apparently, according to some research, a 1-week break could be as beneficial to ‘resetting’ ourselves from our daily work and lives as a break any longer than that. In other words, shorter breaks more often seem like a better path to restoration.
It takes no longer than a week, then, to realise how simple life could be and how much of the complexity that exists in our daily lives is a choice. Beyond food and water, all I seem to need to be at peace is sunlight, a warm rock, and someone to listen.
Occasionally, we eat out at a restaurant and, occasionally, it’s one of those open kitchen restaurants where there’s no wall between us (the diners) and the chefs – we’ve got a full view of all our food being prepared as we order.
One thing I always notice about these kitchens is that despite the number of stoves and ovens they’ve got running, there’s not a single oven mitt in the whole place. Yet, at home, we’ve got draws overflowing with them.
Chefs use tea towels instead of oven mitts because the tea towel has more than one use – cleaning up spills, drying surfaces and hands, making sure other surfaces don’t burn. As an oven mitt, a tea towel is also more versatile because it can be shaped into whatever shape it needs to be to wrap around specialty pots/pan handles and it can accommodate any size or shape of hand.
Art supplies are a bit like oven mitts. Each art store dangles a ‘special’ or ‘deal’ in front of an artist saying, ‘what you really need now is this specialty tool’. But, perhaps, like in kitchens, what we need is to go for a constrained set of tools that can be used in different ways.
If you want to see The Pyramids in Giza you need to do a lot of work before that. Researching and planning flights, booking hotels, maybe learning a few basics of the language so when you arrive you can successfully negotiate with cab drivers or tour operators to get there. Then you need to travel there – that’s an 18-hour flight from Australia. You need to work through airports, traffic, hoteliers, street-vendors and huge cultural differences if you want to see the pyramids.
But, then you arrive, and they are glorious.
Then, shortly after that feeling wears off, you realise that you can’t stay there forever. You’ll need to go home soon.
Any amazing experience doesn’t just happen. Whether it’s visiting The Pyramids in Giza or making your next big art project. Both of these ‘dreams’ sit on a horizon (the pyramids are just a bit more ‘concrete’ than an artistic idea). You can’t just sit on the couch and wait for a flash of divinity to transport you to the pyramids anymore than you can wait for it to produce your ambitious art project.
The promise of the future experience – the feeling we’ll get when we get there – gives us the motivation to do the work to get there. The more work we do to make it happen, the bigger the feeling we get. And, when that experience arrives? Well, it doesn’t last long, but it’s unlike anything else. We take that feeling back home with us and use it as fuel to do the work to reach our next destination; our next ambitious project.
I remember what it was like to be in the presence of the pyramids, and to finish that ambitious art project, and that’s what keeps me motivated to wade through the work to arrive at the next one.
There’s good forgetting and bad forgetting. Bad forgetting is when I can’t remember where I put my keys or glasses. It’s when I can’t remember which shade of green I used for a character that I now need to re-draw for an entire picture book. It’s when I miss my nephew’s birthday. It’s when I can’t find the exact brush I need when I’m mid-wash and only have a limited time before I miss the chance to correct it. Bad forgetting is the type of forgetting that needs structure and routine to guard against.
Good forgetting is entirely different. Good forgetting is when I can’t quite remember how upset I was when grandma died. Or the searing pain when I busted my knee. It’s when I forget I that I couldn’t draw that particular scene many months ago so I try again, and this time, I can do it. It’s when I don’t remember I’ve read a poem, until after I’ve read it a second time, so I get to experience it more than once at different times of my life.
We often associate the idea of forgetfulness with something negative. We talk about it as if it’s a failure and we wish to be less forgetful. But forgetting is useful, it’s an evolutionary advantage.
