Who Taught You How To Draw?

I get asked this question a lot. The answer is so simple that people think I am fucking with them.

No one did. Everyone did.

Every line I draw today comes from something I have seen before. Be it another artist’s drawing that I traced when I was 14, a great master’s painting I saw when I was 17, or a building in shadow I saw when I was 23, I have seen it somewhere before. This leads some people to accuse me of being derivative, and I couldn’t disagree more with that.

To say that because I used a facial shadow like one I saw in a Frank Miller drawing 20 years ago, or because I drew that building based on a layout I saw on a postcard in Brooklyn back in 1980 or even because I have used a similar panel layout on a page I did personally 10 years ago that my art has been done before is to shortchange the drawing I just made.

Every time I put pencil to paper these days, it is with a blank page in my head. On that blank page, my mind literally throws image after image onto the paper like a deck of cards until I see one I like. When I get that image in mind, I hold it onto my mind’s paper and begin drawing it on the real paper. This process can last anywhere from 2 seconds to days, and I have learned by now never to rush it. It is from this storehouse of every piece of art I have seen over my life, every shadow, every person walking down Main Street in Deep Ellum on a Friday night, every image I have seen in movies and television that I draw these images I fly through on my mind’s canvas. I mold these images to fit what I need, like morphing them ala Terminator 2. If I get half a pose from this one and the rest from that, and the shading from another, the three merge and shift until I get the one I am happy with. Sometimes I have to sketch these out to lock them in place and then resift them until it’s just right, but for the most part, they all come from that same mental canvas.

It is precisely this mental manipulation that I think makes all the difference between being unique and being derivative. The amount of artists these days that exist solely because they can copy another artist’s style never ceases to amaze me. I remember back in the day when Todd McFarlane left Spiderman and Marvel brought in artist after artist that drew like him that this notion cemented itself in my head. I would never be that type of artist. I would never copy another. My art would come completely from my own mind. But it doesn’t really, does it? If, as I just wrote, I pull from an enormous mental library of art, video and real life…I’m really just copying, aren’t I? This is the part of the method that I try to explain in my answer to the question “Who taught you how to draw?”

No one did. Everyone did.

We all have this mental image Rolodex in us. This is what enables us to navigate rooms, recognize faces and generally interact in a visual world. The fact that some use this to create something out of an amalgam of all they have seen, while others simply redraw another artist’s work is immaterial. We’re both getting our inspiration from an external source. Where my method differs is in its approach.

When I was in Jr High, my art teachers recognized my ability before I even realized I had it. I just knew from an early age that I could draw well, and never really concerned myself with the fact that others couldn’t. I never realized that made me different.

In High School, my art teachers tried to get me to conform to a copying mentality. Their opinion was that If I could draw the garbage can just like the artist in the School Book did, that made me good. I rejected this. I refused to comply with this idea and my High School art career was cut short. This was not a bad thing though. I disappeared into the library where I discovered other artists like Michelangelo and Picasso. My school didn’t have a lot in the way of art books but I absorbed every page from them nonetheless. I saw in Michelangelo’s painting the subtleties between the color of a fabric in bright light vs. the same fabric nestled under an arm’s cast shadow. Till then I used a single color for a garment. This taught me that there were different ways to signify shade. This was a very valuable lesson for me. Looking at Picasso was more of a challenge for me however. His early work was recognizable. That was a clown, while that was a man. His cubist growth, though well documented in print, was confusing to me. I remember asking myself “Why did he switch gears like that? He was good?” I was unable to answer this question right away but eventually I learned that this was growth. Just as I am not drawing the same things I did at Age ten as I am now, Pablo simply began seeing a better way to do things. Armed with this understanding I began seeing differences in everything I looked at that I never saw before. I began to see growth. This was the most important lesson I learned in High School.

In College, I was an arrogant ass. At least for one semester, I was. I was set in my way, in that I was a comic book artist, and nothing would deter me from learning everything about that skill as humanly possible. Again, my first assault came by way of the school library. Immensely more diverse than the one I was used to, I became exposed to Thomas Nast, Alex Raymond, Burne Hogarth and the like. These artists became my surrogate teachers. It was this point where I began mimicking what I saw; trying hard to do it JUST like Alex did in that third panel of Flash Gordon. I took this mentality to my Art class and while I did passable work, there was just something missing. It was here that I received the absolute best teaching that I have ever gotten, when my professor, Larry Felty asked me quite simply, “Do you have to outline everything?” This was near the end of that first semester, and he had said hardly a word to me the entire class till that point, but this question shook me to my core. In those six words put a mirror to my face and I began to see that I was becoming a mimic. I was trying to draw like someone rather than become a good artist. There IS a distinction between these two, and I will attempt to explain it.

I spent the next semester in college working this out for myself and finally got a grasp on it. I was trying to draw LIKE someone rather than to learn what they knew. I came across a book with a quote “Do not seek to duplicate the efforts of Great People. Rather seek to learn what motivated them to MAKE their decisions.”

In other words, don’t draw like Frank Miller. Learn why Frank drew like he did.

This was a watershed moment for me as an artist. I began to look at chiaroscuro art from the 13th century, and in Japanese woodcuts. I actively studied Rembrandt, who till then I had dismissed entirely. I went over every Leonardo sketch I could get my hands on, and upon learning he did drawings from life, including dissected animals, signed up for a biology class for the SOLE purpose of drawing the dissected animal I would have to produce. I taught myself anatomy from Grey’s Anatomy (Not the television show, Dammit) and studied architecture from Frank Lloyd Wright and then Louis Sullivan, HIS teacher. It was THIS stage when my mental Rolodex began to fly images past me. Prior to this discovery, I would cement an image and doggedly stick to it, come Hell or High Water. I began to see the world in line, shape and shade.

I began keeping a sketchbook and drawing from life whenever I could. I drew the students in the halls, in class and on the bus. I went downtown and sat on the roof of the Starlight Diner in Deep Ellum and drew every building in the Dallas skyline until I could do it from memory. But I had completely chucked my earlier drawing method, and this new one was not as smooth a transition as I make it out to be.

One of the greatest art books I have ever read is Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain by Betty Edwards. One of the tenants of this work is that it is in our nature to draw in ‘code’. When we learn how to draw a nose, we will perfect that drawing and use it as a representative for every nose we ever draw. This is a shortcut, and it was one of the habits I had to break. Granted I still kept that perfected nose in my mind, along with all the noses every other artist ever drew (Good or bad) I also kept a wireframe image in my head of the structure of the nose. The line, the shape, the shade. This way I would be able to manipulate it any way I saw fit until it was the right one to use. This was the method I had to teach myself to use for everything, and it is still the one I use to this day. I never was one for drawing from models. All those figures you see in my comics come from my understanding of the line, shape and shade of the human body. I still use reference photos for things like buildings, cars and guns, but every time I draw one of these, I keep that wireframe image in my head alongside that picture.

I have always thought in pictures so this was pretty easy for me to do. It is this reason that keeps me maintaining to this day that I do not have a ‘style’ in which I draw. You look at comics today and, for the most part, it is pretty easy to tell the artist on any book assuming you have seen their work before by their style. Romita has a very unique style. Miller does too. Simonson also. These artists are masters of their craft, but I do not want to fall into that trap of trying to duplicate them.

Musashi, the great Japanese Samurai wrote that ‘No-Style’ is the best style to have. Limit yourself in one way, and you limit yourself in all ways. Therefore, remove the style, and you remove the limits. (he also said “Distinguish between Gain and Loss in worldly matters.” And “Become acquainted in all arts.” But that’s for another day.”) This means to the learning artist, Draw that line, but never copy it. Know what the line MEANS. Learn what the line IS. These are pretty esoteric terms for a young artist to absorb, but this is the most important lesson of them all.

When an artist learns THIS one single lesson, he or she will understand exactly what I mean when I answer “No one did. Everyone did.”

What I Have Learned (so far...)

I'll be the first to admit that it ain't much. I am mainly self taught in this, with a few rare exceptions. But the things I have picked up along the way guide not just my art but my life as well.

1) Be honest - Always.
This is especially true for the artist. The viewer will always know when you are faking it. Your comfort level increases when you feel what you are doing to be right. Forcing the issue, either throgh a gimmick or trick may mask your shortcomings, but you will know the difference and it will show. It is a badge of honor that a person once described me to someone else as "A man with no secrets." The way I see it, I am my own canvas, and I will only draw on myself what I know to be right.

2) Never stop learning.
This cannot be stressed enough, ever. The second you think you know it all is the second you die inside. I strive to learn something new every day, whether it's a new author, a new artist, a piece of history I haven't read yet or even a newspaper article about fondue. (I hate fondue, btw) My mind is a sponge. Sublime sang "The day that I die will be the day that I shut my mouth and put down my guitar." With me, the day that I die will be the day that I don't care anymore and drop my pencil.

3) Give everyone a second chance at least once.
You are your own best judge and jury when it comes to friends and people you meet, but you really rob yourself when you adopt a 1 strike policy. Granted the wise men say that to allow a man to fool you twice makes YOU the fool, but to rip a chapter from your book that isn't completed will leave you always asking yourself "How will this end?" Better to find out than live with the question unanswered. I'm not a happy-positive person, but I know this to be true from a lifetime of doing it.

4) Practice every day the task you want to do.
This is for all those people out there who say that they need a day off. Screw you and the horse you rode in on. Seriously. You are faced with this choice daily. Be the best there is or just be. There is nothing wrong with the people who just want to be. The world NEEDS them. But to elevate yourself into the upper layer requires a lot more than hoping an wishing. You have to do it. Daily. Be you a doctor, a lawyer, an artist, writer or handyman, the moment you put down your tool is a moment you lose when your life comes to an end. How many of you have been in love? How many of you have said "Why couldn't I have met you a year ago, a month ago, yesterday?" It's the same with your chosen profession. I carry in me the image of myself on my death bed. I have no regrets and I have lived a full life. I have achieved all I wanted to achieve and can die happy. This image is a lie. It is a struggle to become the best, and if you aren't prepared to fight for it evey day of your life, you aren't worthy of seeking greatness. In my heart of hearts, I know that the day I die I will be angry because I still had so far left to go.

5) Eliminate the things in your life that are negative.
WHile this sounds like common sense, how man of us have a daily scab that we pick? How many of us stub our toe on the same piece of furniture at the same time and in the same manner? I learned while I was younger that we all have crap in our lives. This will never change. What we can do is eliminate the unnecessary crap. This opens us up to having to deal with the Necessary crap. It's a daily choice you make.
"I am fat." (I want to eat the cake) [Don't eat the cake] You are not fat anymore.
"My heart hurts." (He/She doesn't treat me right) [Find someone who will] Your heart doesn't hurt anymore.
It's not easy, but nothing in life worth doing IS. You have to fight, sometimes with your own self, to make you happy. The ones who are happy with misery are the ones I haven't the time for.

6) Nothing worth having in life comes easily.
Everything has a price, even a man's soul. The trick I learned here is that you pay the pice regardless of reciept of the goods. If you want to be slim, you have to work out and eat right. If you want to draw like Neal Adams, you better get a sharp pencil and start practicing right now. The fact that we feel joy when we get something that we had to struggle for should be enough to convince everyone that the struggle is necesary, but all too ofen we come across what I call the Jabbas. These are the folk that sit on the couch and expect the world to come to them. We all know one. A lot of people Homer Simpson their way through the world make it with a minimal effort, but these people are rare. And No. Hard work and dedication will not always be rewarded. But the odds tilt dramatically in your favor if you put in the sweat equity. More Olympians fail than they succeed. But they are always Olympians...even the guys that come in last.

There are a lot more.

The one good art teacher I had watched me draw for a full week without saying a word to me, then one day he said "Do you have to outline everything?" It was a simple question but it hit me like a sock full of bolts.
The trick is to be receptive. Keep an open mind. The saying "You never know..." is as old as the spoken language itself. Early man got it, and after 37 years I think I am on my way to getting it too.
--rog--

Breaking the Ice

Being that this is my first 'official' blog you would think I have loads to say. Not the case, actually. I should introduce myself, explain my agenda and try to convince you that the world needs changing in many aspects but essentially it's ok, just the way it is. I know that sounds dichotomic, but it should, as I am a man of dualities. I like finely rendered drawings, chock full of detail but I am at heart a lazy man and lose interest almost half-way through creating such renderings. I have more unfinished works in my trophy case than completed ones.

That said, I am making it a mission to change that.

As far as my drawing style is concerned, I am currently exploring the chiaroscuro look in my art. While I like what it is capable of, am finding holes in it as my preferred choice. I don't think I will ever settle on one art style. To me, at any rate, settling for one style was akin to giving up the learning process. I know that even with that lovely style, the artist has innumerable ways to modify it to fit his self expression, I just hate ruts.

I am the kind of artist that walks just a little ahead of the group, (or maybe behind it would be better described) looking at the stuff that others glanced over and discarded.

The hardest thing I have come across so far in my journey as an artist is that I think it faster than I can draw it. I have tons of junk in my head, but the output is limited by the funnel of my drawing hand and how fast it can move. That has been the bane of my existance at times.

As of this bog, my published works total 2. Both of them art for another writer (Erik Hendrix) and published in anthologies for free. Not a glowing resume, but I have said it before and will say it again, "For an artist, the resume is worthless. Show the portfolio if you want to tell people who you are." So I stick to the gun that it's not where you are printed, rather than WHAT you have printed.

I have ideas in my head now of grand tales, full of epic characters and earth shaking struggles. I also have the mundane image of an old couple sharing a cup of coffee as they venture outside their house for the first time in years. It's funny that both should find firm fertile soil in my mind, but to me it actually seems normal.

I really pity those who don't see the world through an artist's eyes at times. I suppose they must feel the world is a cold empty place. You would think that would place an incredible burden on my shoulders. The responsibility of creating a work that opens a doorway into my world for them to look into feels oppressive at times. When it is juxtaposed with the look I see in someone who gets it though, that makes all the trial and tribulation worthwhile.
--rog--