Being a Beginner

If you know anything about my story, you know that my best drawings growing up were butterflies, hearts and stick figures. I resigned myself to the belief that I cannot draw. I guess I believed drawing came naturally to people. My mother and brother are prime examples. So I stayed away from it. Recently, I have played in the art journal and made different faces out of watercolors; very elementary. I also to expand my drawing skills past circles and squares. So I decided to take a drawing class. I have been to two classes and basically the teacher sets out a still life. It has been fake flowers in a glass vase flanked by two bowls with a towel underneath. The towel is scrunched and twisted underneath to give some texture and more drawing area. And the teacher basically gives minimal instructions and then says go ahead and draw. I was waiting for him to tell me the trick to drawing. I needed that little secret to unlock my drawing skills but that never happened. There wasn't a trick at all. Here is what I learned so far about drawing as a beginner:

You have to learn how to be observant and get out of your head. I was trying to draw the flowers the way I normally draw flowers. But that was not what I was looking at. So instead of drawing what I think a flower looks like, I had to learn to draw what is really there and that is hard. Learning how to truly see things as they are.

Also three dimensions always trips me up. I stopped playing Super Mario Brothers when I was younger because instead of Mario being 2d and running from left to right jumping and dodging bad guys, it went 3d and lost me. So drawing a 3d flower or anything else. NOPE. So that is what I struggle with and its why I fall back to drawing what is in my head instead of what I see. So I am trying to understand 3 dimensions.

And drawing is slow. You don't have to finish by the end of class. Take your time. Use your eraser; it's your best friend. Keep drawing and erasing until you get it to the point that you are satisfied with. You don't have to get it right or perfect. Just til you are satisfied.

Well that's what I learned so far. Oh one last thing. You have to practice when you are not in class. How are you supposed to get better?

Now that's it for now. Maybe I'll show my work but not today...lol. Are you trying anything new these days? I'd love to hear from you.