Advice for Beginner Artists

The best advice I ever got about drawing from life* is: "Draw what you see, not what you know is there." 

My mom told me this when I was twelve or so.  I'd just finished drawing a portrait and couldn't figure out why the eyes looked all creepy and stare-y.  Mom helped me to realize that it's because I'd made the whites of the eyes pure white - which is generally a weird look on a person.  When I looked at my source material more carefully, I saw that the eyes were actually in shadow and nowhere near white - despite my brain insisting otherwise.

Later, in high school art class, I learned an exercise that helps us to "draw what we see": draw a picture from a photograph that's upside-down.  That way, it's harder for your brain to make sense of what it sees and to impose your assumptions all over everything.  Upside-down, most things are reduced to...shapes.  And then you can draw what's really there.


*Or, as the case may be, drawing from a photo of a lady in a magazine...

Conversational Snippet #10: Retro Edition!: Why My Mom is Awesome

[My mom and I are out for brunch; at this point, The Boy and I have been dating for a couple of months and it's going really well, so I mention that I'm seeing someone.  And then I decide to go for the Big Confession:]

Me: ...and, by the way...The Boy is an occasional crossdresser.  I've always liked feminine men, so the crossdressing is a happy thing for me - something I actively wanted and looked for.

Mom: Oh.  [Pause.]  Can you explain something to me?

Me:  Sure...

Mom: Why would anyone want to wear women's clothes if they didn't have to?  They're constricting, they're itchy, they're uncomfortable...

Me: I know, right?  But he's willing to put up with it for the sake of being pretty.  And, hey, better him than me!

So obviously the Big Confession went smoothly.  Frankly, I wasn't that worried anyway: my mom is open-minded* and would be fine with any partner I had as long as he/she/zie treated me well.  But it still felt good to get things out in the open.

By the way, after brunch we hung out at my place for a bit.  My mom spotted a pair of platform Mary Janes tossed in a corner and said, surprised*, "You have girl shoes!" - then she immediately corrected herself: "Wait...they're his, aren't they?"  

And they were.

*And yet, somehow, she manages to be very sheltered at the same time.  She probably hasn't heard of many kinks or alternate lifestyles but if someone explained one to her she'd just go "Well, as long as it's not hurting anyone..."

**It's true that I don't own too many girlie-type shoes...but I didn't think clunky dude-shoes were, like, my trademark or anything.  Considering how shocked my mom was for those two microseconds, though, I guess I come off more butch than I'd realized.  Not that there's anything wrong with that!