They used to say, back in the days of Oxford & Cambridge Examining Board GCE Mathematics (1973) that the student should always show his working out. To demonstrate that he knows NOT just the answer but HOW to arrive at it. Strangely enough I suspect the same concept might and should apply to drawing and to painting, perhaps to all Art with a capital "A". I have always (and mistakenly) treated my sketchbooks as the repository for artistic greatness. In this I will keep all of my DaVinciesque studies. A masterpiece on every page. I start with perhaps 80 pages and, in turn, each drawing goes either "a little bit wrong" or "I'm not happy with that section" or "Just crap from the start". Tidy boy, neat boy, Perfectionist (?) boy. So I tear the page out. When the sketchbook is finally the size of a handout leaflet I discard it or hide it or conveniently forget about it.
Why am I so hard on myself ? Why do I never finish a drawing ? Now and only now finally, I realise in ART it is the working out that matters. The process of drawing. The rough sketched outline is fine. As the shape is described by the objects around it the lines firm up. The various lightly adminstered pencil strokes show where the hard line actually IS. Perhaps only for that split second before the light changes or your daughter knocks over the still life so carefully assembled on the table. But it was and is right. And then finally, you realise what does it matter ; because the NEXT drawing will be even better. As I draw, as I paint, the process becomes more familiar and comfortable and you realise you are AN ARTIST. Or perhaps somebody tells you and then, for no apparent reason, you suddenly believe them. To recapture that feeling, that worrying but exciting stress that you find in struggling determinedly to work something out, you, the artist, know that you will need to attempt working in a different manner, new, or a different medium or stand still. Repeat the same style. However I want to progress my work towards ......what..... and that is the final question. Why do artists do art ?
It is not like in the maths exam where the correct answer achieves the reward. For the artist it seems that it is the process that inspires us. It cannot be for riches or fame (although some artists do manage this). It can't be for the sociable comradeship unless you can share an easel. It is for yourself. A selfish reason : and of course, others may also like your work and that may validate the artist's existence. I paint primarily so that I can be somebody else. When I work with my sketchbook now, I am seeing the world in a far more detailed and interesting way than when I was younger. I am going to fill sketchbooks with my own perspectives on that world. I want to look. I want to be free to view the world sideways in my own way. The artist feels he has a vision and he is fighting to put it on paper, or canvas, or board. To sculpt that vision, to capture it in his viewfinder. I believe in making a mark and drawing in deep breaths.
Note : Due to (at least) two years of cheating in Maths I was put into the top set. Where being a genius I was supposed to take the exam early and pass and go on to Advanced Mathematics. I (of course) failed. Then failed the re-take. I passed it (scraped through Grade 6) the next year from the bottom set. I never showed my working-out because there was none.
Post Note : I now have a calculator,
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