the drawing mind

2011-10-20T14:36:00.001-07:00

The Drawing Lab at Two Sites in Boston starting October

2009-10-06T08:04:00.000-07:00

As humans we all possess a “Drawing Mind” a piece of ourselves that can make sense of the world through a drawn line. The part of our brain that knows how to draw a “bumpy line or a jagged line.” Drawing is thinking in a visual form. Drawing helps us to see better. Drawing helps us to think better. The power of the drawn line as a tool for thinking, connecting, seeing, expressing and healing has yet to be tapped to its full potential.

The Drawing Lab is a space that I created to give visitors an opportunity to engage with their Drawing Mind in an open and experimental way. Through a variety of sensory explorations, visitors draw music, textures, objects, emotions, etc. The Drawing Lab is my invitation as artist and teacher to participants to trust their Drawing Mind to allow it to re-emerge, re-energize and re-connect. This month in Boston, Massachusetts I am setting up The Drawing Lab in two spaces. These spaces not only allow the visitor to connect with their Drawing Mind but will allow for cultural and community connections through the process of drawing. One Drawing Lab will be at the Wyner Museum at Temple Israel. Visitors will connect with Jewish sounds, music, objects, and texts through the process of drawing their responses. The other Drawing Lab space will be part of an exciting new endeavor in Chinatown called the "Chinatown Storefront Library." Which is part of a larger project called, "The Boston Street Lab" The Storefront will open mid-October. Please stop by either location and MAKE YOUR MARK and add it to the Community Drawing Walls.

The Drawing Mind Sketchbook

2009-08-20T13:35:00.000-07:00

This blog is for everyone who wants to re-connect with their ability to make a MARK and DRAW. You may not even know that you are missing drawing or doodling or sketching in your life because you became disconnected from that piece of yourself a long, long , long time ago. You lost your Drawing Mind the time your second grade teacher made fun of your drawing or told you that what you were drawing was not "correct." You shut down. You vowed never to draw again if you could help it. You locked that piece of your self away. This blog is a way to take small steps back to your innate ability to DRAW. There is no "correct" way to draw.

This blog will give you bite sized drawing exercises. Draw for 3 minutes. Fill a page with as many different kinds of BUMPY LINES you can think of. 3 minutes just draw...If you want to jump into the creative process and build your Drawing Mind further a great place to start is with the interactive sketchbook I wrote titled, "The Drawing Mind."

It will get you started on your creative journey...

Drawing Over my Blog

2009-08-19T14:09:00.000-07:00

Whenever I make a drawing there is that moment of reflection. Taking the time to look at what has come out onto the page and take stock. It may be a moment of recognition or disgust or complete surprise. The creative process is like that, a give and take, a getting lost and then finding your way back, a push to take the road never travelled. Undertaking a blog is like creating a drawing. There is a constant need of checking back in and reflection on the whole. I started taking a class today titled, "Blog Triage" with Alyson B. Stanfield at http://www.artbizblog.com and Cynthia Morris at http://journeyjuju.com. I am excited about the prospect of making my blog richer and more exciting. I started on this blogging adventure without a clue about what I was really doing. As an artist I have many lives I lead. I am a painter, printmaker, installation artist and I love to draw. I also love to teach all ages. I have created a piece that travels called "The Drawing Lab." This blog is given over to my passion for DRAWING. I want to share my knowledge about the DRAWING PROCESS and CREATIVITY with everyone because I believe that drawing is an essential language that everyone can access. My blog is geared towards anyone that wants to leap into the world of drawing and visual thinking. We all have the capacity to draw but fear plagues many. I believe we all have what I have called a "DRAWING MIND" that piece of ourselves that knows how to make a MARK on a blank page. My blog is a way to connect us all with one another through the language of drawing. Ideally I would love people to use the blog as a space to share their sketches and scratches and doodles and drawings. We draw for so many reasons and in myriad ways and this blog is a place to highlight and share the infinite variety a drawing can take. Take a moment and think about your day, did you draw a doodle, a sketch, a map, a design, a model, a plan, a line?

iPhone Drawings

2009-08-18T10:17:00.000-07:00

Never liked drawing on computers. I like the feel of the pencil or charcoal on paper. But my grandmother always said "never say "never" and now I have found my technological niche...drawing on my iPhone. If I need a quick fix, a quick draw, I have two minute s before the movie starts I pull out my iPhone and draw. I use the application called, "Brushes." I also have the application named, "Paintbook." Two other apps that I like and now use in my work are: "TypeDrawing" and "Shake Photo."

2009-07-30T17:44:00.000-07:00

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2009-07-25T16:58:00.000-07:00

Sky drawing

2009-07-04T21:26:00.000-07:00

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2009-07-01T22:20:00.000-07:00

2009-06-30T19:08:00.000-07:00

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2009-06-28T15:40:00.000-07:00

2009-06-28T06:17:00.000-07:00

2009-06-28T06:06:00.001-07:00

Drawing is for EVerYONE

iPhone Drawings

2009-06-07T07:06:00.000-07:00

I hate drawing on the computer. I can't feel a sense of the pencil or charcoal on the rough skin of the paper. There is no feeling of touch. But then I got an iPhone. I have had it for almost two years and recently I downloaded a drawing and painting app. just to give it a try. And I have to admit I secretly like it. Not for a real drawing fix but if I am waiting for a movie to start and I need to draw I can do it with out pulling out a lot of stuff...I can draw the person sitting in front of me and it looks like I am just texting on the phone...In the pick up line at school, I can make a quick iPhone drawing. For now it is a sporadic activity but it intrigues me...

2009-06-07T07:03:00.000-07:00

Draw what is in your kitchen drawer

2009-06-07T06:52:00.000-07:00

Sources for drawings are everywhere. Look inside your kitchen drawer and take out a selection of utensils. A hand held egg beater, a wine opener, a can opener, a tea strainer...Look at their shapes. Sit at the kitchen table and draw each one from several different angles. Do 3 blind contours of each object (draw the object without looking down at the paper)...

Binge Drawing

2009-03-18T13:00:00.000-07:00

I have never been a binge drinker but a binge drawer maybe. I don't draw for a couple of days and then I draw so much I can't even see straight. In art school I would draw all day every day for a year. I was covered in charcoal from my forehead to my knees. I think about drawing all of the time but actually doing it every day happens rarely because there is painting and printing and writing and mothering and dog walking and life that gets in the way. But to have those binges of creativity, there is nothing like it. And you don't feel hung over or sick after just completely drained and hungry. So even if you don't draw everyday take a day or a half day and binge draw, draw it all out until there is nothing left inside of you.

Drawing Escape

2009-03-03T10:00:00.000-08:00

Drawing is an escape act. It has to be in a way. A place to go to. A place to disappear.

I like this drawing I found on someone else's blog by Paul Klee.

2009-02-26T08:12:00.001-08:00

Bathroom Drawings

2009-02-26T08:08:00.000-08:00

I was in Miami on Saturday visiting gallery director and friend Barbara Gillman. I have shown in her gallery for 15 years and cherish her guidance and advice. I was at her apartment in her bathroom and one of her artist/friends did a wall drawing. I had to photograph these wonderful, whimsical drawings...Drawing can happen anywhere!

Drawing is Thinking

2008-12-11T07:08:00.000-08:00

Gratitude Sketchbook: Drawing what your thankful for...

2008-12-11T06:59:00.000-08:00

Try keeping a gratitude sketchbook. Everyday during this holiday season draw the things you are thankful for in your life. You can use both images and words. It doesn’t have to be fancy or detailed but allow your thanks to flow on the page. I have been doing this every day for the last couple of months for 10 minutes before I go to bed. I love looking back over the days and seeing all that I am thankful for and how full and varied my thanks can be. I am thankful for my children, my eyes and chocolate, pencils, the sun, movies and my friends...

2008-10-29T19:03:00.000-07:00

Two Hand Self Portrait

2008-10-15T08:21:00.000-07:00

Look in the mirror and without looking down at your paper draw your face with both hands at the same time. Relax into both hands and just calmly let both hands travel on your paper as you look at your FACE. Draw what you see. See how long you can do this without looking at what you are drawing. Let your hands draw over the same spot several times. When you feel ready look at your paper. What do you see? What was it like to draw with both hands at once? Try it again. Switch materials...keep going.

DrawChange

2008-10-06T09:42:00.000-07:00

In these weeks before a national election and as the economy seems to be struggling one can't help but feel out of control. We can't make things happen just because we want them to. We can't predict the future. We can only live in this moment and be present and positive. But sometimes that is hard. Our minds get going and we follow our thoughts into scary places. Drawing is a powerful anecdote to the fear and and not knowing. Draw a line and just follow it. Don't try to control the line and make it go somewhere just let your hand be in control and follow along. Let go and wander on the page...

Daily Draw: Draw your Feelings

2008-08-22T08:36:00.000-07:00

My very special dog Sadie passed away yesterday and words can't begin to express the depth of sadness I feel. She was in my life for 13 years. We got her when she was eight weeks old, bouncy and full of beans. She was a Lab and Shepherd mix and she loved to fetch sticks, chew sticks and protect us all from danger. She was a real guard dog...Saying goodbye to her the other day was one of the most difficult things and I have been crying for days. When emotions take hold, one of the best things to do is to draw. To draw what that emotion feels like. Using marks, I try to express on the blank page what the emotion feels like. Check in with how you are feeling right now and draw out what you are feeling using your marks.

Daily Draw: Two Hand Drawing

2008-08-15T08:59:00.000-07:00

Get both hands in on the drawing action! Choose two different pencils or pens. Put one in each hand. Then without thinking too much try drawing with both hands at once. What happens? What do you notice? Make some designs. Draw some shapes. Try drawing some different marks. Make a two hand drawing every day for a week and see what happens and changes over the week. Do your drawing look different over the course of the week?

Drawing to our sense of TOUCH

2008-08-13T08:25:00.000-07:00

Think of your fingers having EYES and explore your world with your hands. Touch the trunk of a tree, how does it feel? Draw that feeling. Do a rubbing of the tree trunk with the edge of a thick blunt crayon. What marks do you see in your texture rubbing? Do a texture hunt around your house, your neighborhood. What textures appeal to you? Experiment using different media when you draw textures, what media works best for which kind of textures? Cut up your textures and glue them into your sketchbook. On your travels collect textures...

Daily DRAW: TEXTURE

2008-08-13T07:41:00.000-07:00

TEXTURE
How do you use your MARKS: lines, dots, dashes, etc to create texture? When you look at this piece of a drawing what do you think it would feel like to touch that texture? What are some DESCRIBING words that you can use? Ask a friend or family member to hide an object with a lot of texture in a bag. Without looking inside the bag put your hand in and feel the object. Using only your MARKS draw the texture that you feel. Think about how your MARKS describe visually what you are feeling. Repeat this again with another object. How many different types of textures can you draw?

Drawing at the Beach

2008-08-12T07:00:00.000-07:00

I travel with my art supplies. I always have. I feel lost without them. Naked really. Having my drawing pencils and fountain sketch pen and charcoal and my watercolors, I feel a sense of protection. Even with my children and their friends where ever we go I have art stuff on hand. This week we were at the beach and inside my cerulean blue beach tent I painted and drew and before I knew it I was surrounded by six children all wanting to get in on the painting and drawing action. Kids love to make art. They love to draw and paint and they just need an opportunity to do so. A corner of a room with art materials always at the ready or a backpack in the car filled with real watercolor paper and cray pas and pencils and other materials allows kids to explore their creative sides when they need that outlet. And it doesn't need to be just for the kids but the whole family can get involved. But accessibility is key, having the materials ready so it isn't a chore to get them out and set up. In my purse I always have the basics, a small sketchbook and my pencil and fountain pen...a couple minutes before a movie begins, waiting for my gas to fill, in the pick up line at my kids school, I draw at the drop of a hat anywhere I can...

The Drawing Lab is in color at the Arsenal Center for the Arts

2008-08-02T17:41:00.000-07:00

The Drawing Lab is open this summer at the Arsenal Center for the Arts in Watertown, MA and it's in color. An assortment of color paper, along with a variety of drawing materials in a range of colors is out for people to choose from for their drawings. People of all ages have come in and made a range of drawings. It seems like a favorite at the Drawing Lab at the Arsenal is the two hand self portraits. Visitors sit in front of a wall of mirrors and with a pencil in each hand they draw their face with both hands at the same time. There are two walls filled with visitors drawings. If you are in the Boston area, come and make your mark in color at 321 Arsenal Street, Watertown, MA.

Slowing Down to Draw

2008-07-31T05:59:00.001-07:00

It's summer and Boston is quiet. Things slow down in the summer. Sometimes it feels like walking through molasses, the air thick and humid and a nap in the middle of the day seems like the perfect antidote to the heat. And we take time to slow down, we build in that time to rejuvinate and re-charge. Try slowing down your drawing too. Look at one object like a broken shell from the beach or an interesting pine cone and slow your looking down and discover the object with your eyes. As you are looking carefully and slowly draw what you see, the journey your eye takes. Try not looking at your paper when you draw and see if you can draw this one object for five minutes, then 10 minutes, studying the minute details of the surface. For a week try doing a daily slow drawing. What happens when you draw this way? Don't judge the drawing but sense the larger connection to the world around you by drawing in this slow way.

Doodles for all

2008-07-14T13:27:00.000-07:00

Doodles. That word confuses me sometimes. As I encourage people to draw I want them to be free but to say it's "just a doodle" in a way it dimishes the act of drawing. "Oh that was just a doodle." But doodles are thinking or visual explorations and should not just be passed over because we are not as "in control" of them as other kinds of drawings. Sometimes our "doodles" are more interesting than other drawings. So, PLEASE DOODLE but take your doodles seriously (sort of), your doodles are your drawing mind getting out there, being seen...So, as I was shopping in a mall yesterday (one of my least favorite things to do) I ended up in a discount book store and found a book on Presidential Doodles. For a long time I have wondered if presidents doodle...and now I have some of their actual doodles in my hands so I can peruse them and think about what kinds of drawings came out of their different minds...Happy Doodling...

Skecthbook Junkie

2008-07-07T08:02:00.000-07:00

I am a sketchbook junkie. I can not live without keeping a sketchbook sometimes I keep 5 in no apparent order but I keep one in the car, one in my bag, one by my desk and a couple in my studio. I NEED my sketchbooks. Other women have a yen for funky shoes, I have a need for sketchbooks and I am always chasing after the best one. The one that is the right size, has the right weight and smoothness of paper, has a study cover, just feels right to me. Whenever I teach the first thing I tell my students no matter what age is you need a SKETCHBOOK to capture your images, thoughts, scraps of memories, interesting shapes or textures. I watch my filled sketchbooks grow. A small tower of my minds journey in the world of blank pages...I have small sketches of someone on the subway next to a snippet of poetry...I have a postcard that has captured me glued in next to a blind contour of a photo from the newspaper. I keep a sketchbook of my hands. I do a blind contour of my hand every day for ten minutes. I need to sketch like a dancer needs to dance. It is like my air. My fingers need to feel the feeling of the pencil or charcoal move along the empty white page and emerge from the path travelled new, with fresh eyes and more connection to my world and my self.

Are all BUMPY Lines the same?

2008-06-09T14:41:00.000-07:00

The Drawing Lab expands...

2008-06-09T14:23:00.000-07:00

I want to bring my passion for drawing to everyone. There are times like now when I am in my studio when there is a small voice inside me that is begging to paint but there is that need in me to create these DRAWING LABS so that others can experience their own ability to make a line on the page. To give people back their sense of their creative selves. As I spend more and more time in schools I sense a desperation in our society to just make a mess and get lost in a creative process. I can give that to people. I can create spaces where people can experiment and explore and get back to something that inside of us we all have. Our innate ability to scribble...It is freedom, it is our right, it is our humanness that calls for this place to follow an unknown path...to make drawings for no reason, with no mistakes, to find out something by closing our eyes, drawing and taking a chance.

I am creating a new DRAWING LAB at the Arsenal Center for the Arts in Watertown, MA. It will open June 22, 2008. Unlike the New Art Center Drawing Lab this one will be in color. Color drawing tools like pastels, oil pastels, drawing pencils...but NO MARKERS. Too easy and familiar... There will be new stations too. New ways to experiment with drawing. It will be set up like a maze and people will have a map to find all the Drawing Experiments...

Drawing On

2008-06-06T06:07:00.001-07:00

It is hard to believe it has been so long since my last post. So much has happened. Over 600 drawings were created in the drawing lab and I am amazed at how given the opportunity. materials and set-up people are willing to jump in and draw. I think people crave this kind of outlet and expression but they have too few opportunities to just draw their own line, in their own way. Adults, children, artists and non-artists all explored with their own mark making capabilities. One day I spent two hours with an older nun in the lab and as we drew together we talked about spirituality, creativity and the potential that lives in each one of us. I will be setting up the Drawing Lab for the summer at the Arsenal Center for the Arts in Watrtown, MA as part of their show Center as a Canvas. It will be up from June 22-the end of August. Come and make your mark.

A View of the Drawing Lab

2008-04-13T20:16:00.001-07:00

The Drawing Lab

2008-04-13T20:10:00.000-07:00

The Drawing Lab is open at the New Art Center in Newton, MA and people of all ages are DRAWING in it. The opening for the exhibit was Friday night the 11th of April and the Lab was filled with people trying a variety of drawing materials, making their marks in their own particular ways and getting into the PROCESS of drawing. They listened to MUSIC and made drawings in the Listening Chair. They made drawings for the zoetrope and saw their drawings move with this simple animation machine. They made drawings while looking in a microscope or feeling different textures in the Touch Boxes...The Community Drawing Wall is filled and I cannot wait to see more drawings fill the wall...

My Drawing Lab at the New Art Center

2008-04-13T19:58:00.000-07:00

2008-03-26T17:03:00.000-07:00

The Drawing Wall is Expanding

2008-03-25T13:29:00.000-07:00

The show that I am co-curating at the New Art Center in Newton, MA is opening in two weeks and we install this weekend. I am down to the wire getting all of the pieces done for my interactive Drawing Lab...Here are some photos of the Drawing Wall that I am creating for the exhibit. It keeps growing and expanding. Every day I try to think about new ways to draw and put my ideas out there through the tip of a pencil, the end of a conte crayon, the smooth sliding point of a gel pen or the flat surface of a piece of charcoal. The possibilities for exploration are really endless and in the Drawing Lab I want to give people the freedom to follow their ideas for drawing and creating...

My Daughter's Pencil Collection

2008-03-23T16:39:00.000-07:00

Drawing as a way to connect more deeply with the world.

2008-03-21T04:48:00.000-07:00

Drawings for me come from a deep need to connect with the world and to connect with myself. I draw constantly anywhere I can. In that process of drawing I find that I see more clearly. That clarity may not be present in the finished drawings but my eyes, brain and soul are more connected than before I picked up the pencil. In my wall of drawings I try to capture the fullness and chaos of the lived experience. I look at and draw from a variety of sources: from microscope images to a basketball player taking a jump shot to a drawing of my grandmother sleeping days before she passed away. I experiment with different media, as well as playing with different ways to draw. I use two hands at once, my opposite hand, blind contour or whatever pushes me in new directions.

Blind Contour of My Hand

2008-03-20T23:05:00.000-07:00

2008-03-20T22:51:00.000-07:00

Drawing without Definition

2008-03-20T22:37:00.000-07:00

Drawing has no definition. It is what you bring to the process. It is your marks, your choice of materials, your choice of paper and how you jump into the process of making your mark. Will you close your eyes and draw? Draw with both hands at the same time? Attach your charcoal to a stick and draw standing up? Will you draw large, draw small? The choices are yours. You are in charge with how the pencil will move over the blank and empty page. It is freedom seen unfolding before your eyes in a concrete form. Freedom of your line making it's own way, it's own journey. There is no right way, perfect way to engage in the process of drawing. Drawing has no definition. Drawing is what you bring and where you take your mark.

TRY THIS: Using just marks (lines, dots, dashes etc.) draw FREEDOM. How do you express that sensation just with marks on the page? Draw three versions of "Freedom" and then try drawing the opposite. Try not using anything but your marks.

2008-03-02T19:11:00.000-08:00

2008-03-01T20:55:00.000-08:00

Family Tree

2008-03-01T20:54:00.000-08:00

Large Drawings in exhibit at the Arsenal Center for the Arts

2008-03-01T20:48:00.000-08:00

Scraps of Drawing Thoughts

2008-02-26T14:18:00.000-08:00

Why the "Donate" Button

2008-02-26T14:06:00.000-08:00

Drawing with students and teachers in the Boston area, I am continually amazed at the power of the drawn line and how once someone is given the permission to DRAW without worrying about making mistakes the possibility for discovery and deep thinking in schools is possible. The work I do is supported by small grants, PTO's and alot of my own time. If you are reading this blog, believe in the power of creativity for change and want to help me spread the word that DRAWING is another vehicle for THINKING in schools then you may wish to donate to my cause...I will send you via snail mail a small original drawing for donations over $50. Email me your address once you have made a donation and a drawing will follow...Thank you.

drawing over

2008-02-26T06:56:00.000-08:00

I draw on everything. No scrap is safe. And when I find the back of an envelope or an old "to do" list I can't help but want to draw on the surface. To re-make the random scrap into something else. To redeem it in some way, recycle it or layer a new moment on top of the old. Drawing over. Drawing over, like a roll over in the game of Yahtzee, it is hard to take a "roll over" in the game of our lives but when we "draw over" we get to start again, re-do something. Obliterate it if we want. Find a scrap in your house. Something to Draw Over and make marks all over the surface. make the old, recycled paper into something new, different, changed. Find 10 scraps and do this 10 times and see where you end up...

2008-02-26T06:53:00.000-08:00

2008-02-26T06:51:00.000-08:00

Make Your MARK

2008-02-26T06:03:00.000-08:00

Why are so many people afraid to draw? To make a mark on an empty white page? Of placing a line, a dot, a mark on a surface? As someone who draws to survive, draws to think, draws to get lost, draws to feel connected, draws to SEE, I always wonder to myself why do most people feel disconnected to an activity that in many ways is central to who we are as humans? As I have taught well over 2000 people to draw from children to adults I am on a mission to get people to DRAW. To make that first mark and see where their pencil can take them...to follow the journey of your own line.

Discipline and Drawing

2008-02-03T16:30:00.000-08:00

Drawing is about experimenting and discovery. Drawing is about making a mess and getting lost in the chaos and then finding your way through the lines and marks on the page to an unintended place. But in order to get to that new territory you need to give yourself time to make that mess and discover what lies beneath the plain white page. Setting aside time each day to draw is essential. Making time to draw takes discipline, to set aside that time to get lost. Everyday we have an abundance of choices of what to do with our time. Even picking up a pencil and drawing for 10 minutes will keep your line alive.

2008-01-26T21:21:00.000-08:00

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2007-11-17T08:18:00.000-08:00

I draw my hand everyday. Even though I am looking at the same hand the way that I draw it is always different. Drawing is a process of discovery and uncovering and finding new paths to follow from the tip of your pencil. My eyes are awakened when I draw. And every time I draw my hand I see it anew.

2007-11-17T08:16:00.000-08:00

Keep Your Pencil Moving

2007-11-15T17:06:00.000-08:00

Draw a fast line and see where it takes you. Fill up a blank page with a fast line that fills the page. Make it thick and thin and just see where your pencil leads you. When you have filled your page try another drawing this time fill your page with a very slow moving line and watch it travel carefully across the page. Watch the line grow and change before your eyes. When you are done with the two drawings compare them. What do you notice? How did you feel drawing each one?

Drawing Your Line

2007-11-13T15:05:00.000-08:00

Drawing is a way in to seeing ourselves and the world around us. I love to draw and to teach others to draw and to use their pencil as a way to take a journey...a journey of the line with no set destination. Pick up a pencil and fill your page with 20 different kinds of lines: a bumpy line, a jagged line, a short line, a powerful line, a feathery line, a short line, a fat line, a spiral line...keep going and see where your line leads...

The Drawing Mind

2007-10-07T21:25:00.000-07:00