Making Mistakes
Are you willing to fail in your art attempts?

Are you willing to make bad art* in order to learn to make better art with the hope of eventually making good, or even brilliant art?

*Definition of bad art - art that is filled with so-called mistakes or inaccuracies.

Most of us are scared to death someone is going to confront us for being frauds, for masquerading as an "ARTIST" (said with a French accent) when we know good and well we're not. Scary, huh?

And yet, I've never had it happen. Even when I'm making art that is less than stellar, I've only ever received neutral or nice comments.

The fear is persist and often paralyzing. It holds us hostage and we don't get any better because we're afraid to make mistakes.

And there's the irony...because making mistakes is how we learn to do better, to do differently. 

Draw during the performance, color and text added later 7 x 5.5 inch spread in no name watercolor journal

Drawing People
Artists want to draw people in their sketches, but their fear stops them. When they finally do add people and the figures "don't look right," the artist freaks out and vows to never, ever add people to a sketch again.

The next time they try, they've built their fear of people into a bigger fear in their minds and when they fail to meet their goals again, the fear increases. Eventually, the fear of drawing people grows until drawing people seems nearly impossible.

Sound familiar? Stop and consider two things…

Maybe, instead of trying to put figures into a sketch, you should consider drawing JUST people in a junk journal for a while until you get the hang of them. Second, make up your mind that you'll make mistakes, draw crooked lines, wobbly noses and too-small heads and that it's okay—you're learning. Be excited for the opportunity!

Learning To Draw People
So back to drawing people…there are three things I highly recommend you do when you want to learn or improve your people-drawing skills:

            1. Draw people you don't know. Seriously.
            2. Be prepared to make lots and lots and lots of mistakes.
            3. Make it fun!

1. If you start out trying to draw people you know, you're adding waaaaay more pressure than you need. Would it be wonderful to draw your BFF from your last camping trip? Absolutely, but if your BFF turns out looking like Godzilla drawn by a 4th grader, your BFF may be notifying the creativity police to revoke your license!**

**Just in case you didn't know, creative licenses are non-revokable!

If you don't know the person, then it no longer matters if it looks EXACTLY like them especially if they never see it. Yay! That drops the pressure. As long as it looks like a human body, you've scored a win!

Do you think those guys from the orchestra will ever see that page? It's doubtful, but if they do, I'm sure they'll understand the concept of practice, practice and more practice.

2…and 3. It's hard to separate points 2 and 3 because here's the bottom line—if it's not fun and I'm making a lot of mistakes, I'm gonna stop. Why torture myself that way even for the sake of learning? I figure you're probably the same way.

We learn more, we learn better and we learn faster when the learning is fun.

When I'm working on improving my skills in an area where I'm in need of significant improvement, I do my best to find a way to make it fun. In the very top sketch, I went to see the Sarasota Pops Orchestra perform the music of Billy Joel with my sister-in-law. I was fortunate enough to be sitting in the seventh row and there was enough light (most of the time) to see my sketchbook.

It was a bit wild—music flowing, people clapping and singing along, performers on stage dancing and moving around, lights flashing different colors—and it was kinda overwhelming, but I figured what the hey, this was a chance that would never come again.

At times, I had to stop drawing a musician until he came back to a similar pose I had originally begun on my page. Other times, I was singing along or clapping to the beat rather than drawing. I was having fun and I didn't know any of those people! And bonus, it was dark enough that no one but my SIL and the guy next to me knew what I was about.

Mall Lunch Crowd Drawn in Traveler's Notebook by Midori

On the mall sketches, I went to the food court at the large mall near me and picked the restaurant with the longest, slowest line, Chipotle's Mexican Grill. I positioned myself where I had a good view but not close enough to be noticeable.

And this is where I'm going to add Suggestion Number 4: Set clear goals!

Are you looking to sketch body/posture? Capture motion? Capture a likeness? Create a portrait? How much detail do you need? Are you focusing on clothing or draping or shape or texture or facial features or hair or little kids or women or men or teenagers or or or…

Know what you're going to practice BEFORE YOU START! By breaking it down to specific goals, you're more likely to feel successful about your attempts. If you're working on the bodies and their posture or movement, do you have the time to also focus on the facial features?  If you want to work on facial features, why are you drawing their whole bodies?

Back at the mall, I wanted to capture a general likeness with a focus on body shape and posture. As I observed my victims subjects, I made up stories in my head about where they worked or why they were at the mall. Some had badges on a lanyard. Obviously, they were on break for lunch, but where did they work, what type of work?

I worked in pencil and then went back and worked in pen on a couple before I decided it wasn't really necessary.


I then decided narrow my focus to just working on body types and to leave off the heads/facial details all together as I was spending way too much time trying to capture the details of their faces.

I found posture was hard to capture accurately as some folks lean or cock their hips and it became a challenge to recreate it on the page.

Something to practice, to observe well and to observe quickly. I often fell prey to drawing what I "thought" was there rather than what was really there. Hence, the guy's feet at bottom left look like the belong on an elf.

Practicing Anytime, Anywhere
We get caught up thinking we have to go somewhere special to draw, we need special tools, or a certain amount of free time to pursue our art goals to which I say, "Hog wash!"

That's excusing-making and procrastination talking. Sketch the guy on television, sketch your favorite comedian. Look at people in a magazine or online. The point is to keep at the goal until you develop the skills you want and need.

If you find yourself standing in line, waiting in the doctor's office, for the CPA or for your kids to get out of school, look around and see if there's anyone you can practice on.

When combine conscious thought, intention and practice, we have an unbeatable combination for learning. So what are you waiting for?! Start sketching!

The Bottom Line
If you truly want to draw people then draw people. Draw nothing but people. Make people your focus for however long it takes to begin to get comfortable with drawing them. Learn to observe. Then learn to observe quickly. After the skills of how to draw people have solidified into a decent skill base, go back to adding them into a sketch that provides them with an environment.
Have fun, play, experiment and keep filling the page!

Preliminary Sketches of Cecilia DeBearvoire Permanent Ink Click to enlarge

My apologies for not posting the preliminary sketches of Cecilia in the last post here. Her face is actually much more accurate in these sketches than in the painting. She looks a bit, ummm, grouchy. Or maybe she's just mad. Either way, her face is not a "happy face."

Something else I was having trouble with was her body proportions. She doesn't really have shoulders and her arm are longer than her legs. Working out proportions on this page gave me a better chance for succeeding in my painting.

I've got a few more critters in my collection that I think I'll be using for practice as well. They're light and small if I want to carry them with and they usually have such endearing faces that they're fun to sketch!

When I get more sketching done in my "junk journal" (see prior post), I'll post them here!

Happy drawing!

Cecilia DeBearvoire Watercolor and ink 5 x 5 inches Pineapple Journal

How often do you draw?

I'm talking about a piece of paper and pen* for the purpose of JUST drawing rather than drawing something to plop paint on top of later. Once a week? Once a month? Ever? Never?

If you answered hardly ever, you're in good company. The majority of artists I know only draw when they want to create a finished piece of art, be it a painting, sketch or plein air work.

Can you image what the NFL or pro golf would look like if the players didn't practice the very basics every day, for long hours?

A very unorganized circus flits through my mind. Maybe the Keystone Cops.

So why do we, as artists, think we shouldn't have to practice our basic skills? Regularly?

Let's face it...drawing is the foundation of most art. Values, shadows, form shapes, proportions and use of line are some of the very things that trip us up if we don't practice them.

Does the mere mention of these things make you cringe and want to flip to the next blog? I understand. It doesn't sound like much fun. But when I realized that my lack of knowledge and how to create values, shadows and use line was what stood between me and enjoying the creation of my art, I decide to learn.

And it wasn't hard. It just took being willing to try and acknowledging that I was gonna look bad some of the time. I had to keep putting marks on the paper. It took willing to do a really lousy job. Again and again until I finally got to something I liked. Did that mean it was perfect? Nope! Far from it. It just meant I could live with it.

Working in a junk journal** took all the pressure off from me. Since the paper was lousy, I wasn't expecting a masterpiece before I ever put pen to paper. Using pen made me look more closely at what I was drawing because I only had one shot at getting it down accurately.

I'm often asked "how do I learn?" or "where should I start?" and here is my very best advice:

Grab a junk journal and a pen. Doesn't matter what kind of pen or what color. Sit down anywhere and begin to draw what is in front of you. Doesn't matter what it is. Draw. Draw badly. Draw for 15 minutes. It is your choice whether you stop for the day or if you go for another 15 minutes. Come back the next day and do it again. And again. And again. Once you start getting the hang of your chosen scene, move to a new one.
Too intimidating?
Start with a cup, a box, a glass, a vase or some other simple structure. Draw it for 15 minutes every day. Change your perspective by looking up to the item, down into the item and then turn it on its side or at an angle. Once you've mastered that item, add another. Play with lighting to give you shadows. Draw. Every day. Draw, draw, draw.

These drawings are not for creating finished art though there may be some good candidates. They're to help you learn to see, to help you develop eye/hand coordination and to help you demystify drawing.

We're talking 15 minutes a day here. Surely, you have 15 minutes a day?

Classes help, but you don't have to wait to start with a class. Start where you are, use what you have.

Agree to do it badly so that you can improve. Be honest, but not brutal, when you look at your work. This is right, this is not. Done. Turn the page and do it again.

Look through some drawing books at your local library. Look at children's color books and draw what the artist has drawn. Not to steal their idea, but to learn how they created the image using just lines.

There is no magic pen, pencil, brush nor paper that I know of to make us morph instantly into the artist we all want to be. Just some practice learning the basics.

Now, how often do you draw?

*When we use a pen, we eliminate the possibility of erasing/correcting and so therefore we learn faster because we observe more closely. Without that eraser, we give up our safety nets. Our observation skills improve much faster.
**A junk journal is a cheap journal/sketchbook of blank pages. The paper is cheap junk. It's not good for much more than pen and ink. It may bleed through to the other side. It doesn't matter. It doesn't take color, washes or anything else. That's okay. It's simply a tool for learning. Once you're skills start improving, using the "good stuff" (read that the "expensive stuff") won't be nearly so intimidating.