jfc Kevin stop starting drafts of blog posts and then never actually pressing publish on them. it’s just the internet! who cares.
Plus I am getting deep into my next project and it would be nice to update/tie off the previous one first.
Anyways one of my things this year has been LEARN HOW TO DRAW. I decided I would draw something every day and hopefully at some point feel like I’m getting better at it. I watch youtube videos here and there. I just draw whatever is handy. bottles, silverware, the tv. At some point I started drawing receipts and I really liked the challenge of drawing them so I kept at it and that is what I mainly draw at this point. Here are some pictures.
I have always thought of myself as A Person Who Cannot Draw. I took a figure drawing class at Cambridge Adult Ed (charcoal) in my 20s and felt like a failure. So I just went on my way, identifying as a person who can’t draw. But forcing myself to draw every day immediately flooded me with memories from elementary school, lying on my bedroom floor, drawing guitars and the MTV and Van Halen logos over and over. Drawing was a huge part of my life, my identity, my free time. Why did I completely forget about that? I understand the idea of youth being braver/less terrified of creative failure, but at some point I completely mentally rewrote my history to fit this narrative of me not being able to draw. How did I learn to think that I can’t draw, and how do I learn to unlearn it?
One other random thing, not sure why drawing receipts appeals to me so much but recently I was visiting my mom’s house and noticed receipts everywhere. Every room I went into, every drawer I opened, she had receipts tucked away. Like anything she ever purchased may be subject to return at some distant point in the future. I’m not going to dig into that any deeper, just noting it and moving on.