click here to see this sketchbook
When you've been drawing since you were a small child (and lets face it most of us have), it is often a challenge to find new ways to push the boundaries, enhance your skill set or find new territories to explore. So, given the fact that I seem to have a form of obsessive compulsive disorder towards drawing: an insatiable desire to doodle, scribble and shade, I thought it would be a good idea to dedicate this creative tendency to a specific sketchbook which in time I named: Journeys of a Pen.
'I had never been much of a conformist.'
I've never been one for laborious life drawing sketching or on-site architectural studies or even landscape drawing for that matter. Many years ago when college/university 'life drawing' classes were compulsory, I found myself repeatedly searching for ways to defy the task at hand by drawing the negative space around the the model with a human shaped void in the centre. I became a master of drawing sinks, easels, coats and bags, anything but the figure. Life drawing classes were there to serve a purpose: to teach the art of form through the use of measuring, proportion, tone and line but this mathematical approach bored me to the bone and I had never been much of a conformist, either.
'... The universal language of the globe'
For me, drawing had to have personality, vibrancy and energy. Almost anyone can be taught to draw using a ruler or measuring device, basic principles can be quickly learnt or even mastered within a short space of time, but principles and mastery are to be explored, not obeyed. I've always attempted to create work with a bit of soul: to speak of experiences, emotion and imagination, with hopefully a few rules broken along the way. These were the attributes that excited me. I believe drawing has always been, and continues to be, the most direct method of translating and communicating a multitude of stimuli and experiences, its the universal language of the globe. It speaks in many styles, accents and environments across cultures, and in an academic form its eclectic nature seems to decompose and die a slow and painful death. So, having experienced this first hand within the walls of the creative institutions I had attended, I set about creating my own book, one that challenged convention, principles and mathematics in drawing.
'subtle stories and connotations of places I'd been, seen, touched and heard.'
The Journeys of the Pen is an amalgamation of various drawing techniques I have developed through the years. The book was purposely small enough to fit in my pocket so that I could record all aspects of my day-to-day experiences: the sensation of speed, walking, conversations in public space, erratic vibrations and the list goes on. It began with an interest in creating images that were loaded with subtle stories and connotations of places I'd been, seen, touched and heard. What later developed was a deeper understanding of the relationships between space and time within the drawing process and ways of manipulating the process to cater for changing environments and circumstances. The boredoms of the studio were now a distant memory and so were the neat, traditional drawings borne from the sterile world of academia.
'I had to let go of the idea of creating a resolved piece of art'
One of the first challenges I came across was how to draw subjects that were moving really quickly and only in the-line-of-sight for a short moment. To achieve this I had to form a technique that broke from the doctrines and formalities that had been etched into my mind over the years. Drawing the landscape from the window of a moving train posed a major problem. Convention was telling me to view the image, and then to draw it onto the paper as accurately as possible but the images that came out consistently looked calculated, stagnant and void of rhythm. I found that the only way to truly capture all aspects of this experience: the flow of movement, the vibrations and speed, I would have to draw the path of the eye directly onto the paper, this meant avoiding eye contact with the page or cutting it out all together. This opened up the process to chance and spontaneity. When sat on a train, limited time scales in which to draw moving subject matter, meant that I had to let go of the idea of creating a resolved piece of art. It was surprisingly hard to do as ingrained within me was the expectation that once the drawing was finished, I should have a resolved, clinical image, to show for it. Instead, I explored a process of absorbing and recording information simultaneously. To loosen up my style and break from this innate expectation I began recording imagery as quickly as possible and within varying time frames. One of the best methods for this was drawing adverts on the TV: these were short, sharp and saturated with visual imagery. After I was confident with the results I moved onto three dimensional subject matter. Below are a few early examples of this process.
'I began to approach each drawing in the same way I would when taking a photograph'
I became more and more captivated by this technique the more I practised it. By actively excluding the decision making process from the act of drawing I opened up the imagery to random occurrences and created the space for a more organic method of translating (in this case) visual information. It excited me to finish the drawing and look down at the page to find faces overlapping, the eye from one face completing the face of a different person. Another unexpected outcome of this technique was that the images seemed to suggest form in the most concise, expressive, manner possible. Each drawing appeared to be missing some form of visual information: an ear, one side of the face, the stump of the tree, but yet still the most minimalistic of images had enough descriptive information to provoke the viewers imagination enough to suggest its origin. Away from automatism, I began to approach each drawing in the same way I would when taking a photograph: what am I trying to capture? The motion? Form? Emotion? Just like selecting the shutter speed or aperture I began to question what I was trying to achieve and then select the correct drawing techniques for the job. We are conditioned through all aspects of life to make calculated, informed decisions but I suppose what I found was that sometimes you have to break away from what you know, to create room for instincts, accidents and innovations. This way we can learn to balance all corners of the brain, both inner and outer within our creative processes.
click here to see this sketchbook
Not all of the drawings promote the technique of drawing without looking at the paper. Here I try to represent the amalgamation of conversations, on a single train journey during rush hour. All of the words and sentences overlay and clash, some soft, some subtle, some loud, some quiet.
Passing Conversation, ink on paper - by Aidy Brooks