Drawing, that thing that most people do even if it’s an absent minded doodle. Drawing, that process that art schools condemned not so very long ago, but is now right back in fashion (it never really went away for most of us). Drawing, that thing that needs constant practice. Drawing, that thing that helps you develop your own language for expression. Drawing, that thing that thing where people say, ‘oh that’s good,’ ‘that’s not right, but mind you, I’m rubbish at drawing.’

No two people draw alike. Your drawings are as distinctive as your handwriting

I have always made myself work. Don’t just sit staring at the daunting, expectant paper. Just put something down – hopefully it wll lead to another thing, and before you know it the drawing may be underway like a slow locomotive pulling out of the station before it speeds down the track. Gerald Scarfe, The Long Drawn Out Trip, Little Brown 2019. https://www.geraldscarfe.com

The moment you put down two or three marks on a piece of paper, you get relationships. They’ll start to look like something. If you draw two little lines they might look like two figures or two trees. One was made first, one second. We read all kinds of things into marks. You can suggest landscape, people and faces with extremely little. It all depends on the human ability to see a mark as a depiction. David Hockney, http://www.hockney.com/works/drawings/2010s

Drawing could start anywhere. A crayon scuffs paper and the child holding it sees a mark emerge. A brush runs along a batten and look, there is a line. Yhe skid of a swung stick describes fine curves in the sand; the effects of our actions interest us and we make further marks. A zone of attention forms. Within this mental zone, whatever dots, edges or curves we produce seem to gang up and find ways of relating to one another- rhythms, behaviour patterns. Julian Bell. Ways of Drawing, Thames and Hudson 2019. https://www.royaldrawingschool.org

How Drawing Can Set You Free www.ted.com/talks/shantell_martin_how_drawing_can_set_you_free

Draw up, draw in, draw something today!