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The COVID 19 pandemic has been a long, strange trip – for everyone.  I’ve watched more Netflix videos than I thought I would ever watch in my life.  Like everyone, I never thought I would spend this much time at home, but hey, at least I can paint!  But painting requires an audience, at least eventually.  I miss entering art shows, going to art receptions, and taking the occasional art class. 

Art classes give me the opportunity to improve basic skills and techniques, learn new ones, and interact with other like-minded painters.  Being stuck at home so much during the pandemic, it seemed like a good time to improve some skills.  Trouble is, art classes now are pretty much online only, and I just can’t get excited about that.  I have purchased and watched a few tutorial videos, but I just felt I needed more.  So I started going through my rather extensive collection of art instructional books that I have collected over the years.  Although I have read all my books, I often find that reading them for a second time really helps me understand and remember concepts better.  So, I decided to go “back to school” and revisit my little home art library.  Since drawing is considered fundamental to art, (at least representational art) I started with a great book I had on drawing  - Lessons in Classical Drawing by Juliette Aristides. 

I enjoyed reading it the first time, but this time I really took my time and actually did all the lessons which appear at the end of each chapter.  Taking my time with this book and the lessons really did improve my drawing ability.  I remembered techniques I had long ago forgotten, rules I once knew but never think of, and brushed up on some basic perception lessons.  But here’s the best thing -  I remembered just how much FUN it is to draw!  I’ve been spending many happy hours, listening to Joni Mitchell tunes, sketching copies of masterpiece drawings and various items around my house.  The great thing about drawing is that it takes only a pencil, paper and an eraser, for the most part.  Such a simple and relaxing activity, I thoroughly enjoyed myself!

     Conch Shell, graphite and chalk on paper

After I finished the book, I found that drawing out my ideas for still life compositions became so much easier, and infinitely more enjoyable.  As artist Andrew Loomis once said “Drawing is vision on paper.”  I have tended to underestimate the importance of sketching out different ideas before committing to a composition for a painting.  Getting my artistic vision out of my head and onto the paper is critical, but sketching and drawing can seem like such a chore.  Developing better drawing skills has made that effort much more fun and effective. 

The next book in my art library I’m revisiting is “Mastering Composition”, by Ian Roberts.  I’m looking forward to improving my composition skills - and who knows, it might just be the subject of a future blog!