Book of the Week: Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain

16 Oct 2016

drawing_on_the_right_side_of_the_brain This week I read Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain by Betty Edwards, because I was inspired to improve my drawing skills after finding out about 100 Days of Childhood Memories: The Book. Previously I read The Elements of Drawing, which also talks about drawing. At first I was going to finish the book in a week, but after going through the first part of the book, I need to stop reading it. To get the most value out of the book, you need to read the book and stop and do the exercises, which take about an hour each. Unless you do the exercises in the book, there isn’t a point to reading the book cover to cover. Drawing is not so much as creating art, but having the skill to see the world. Drawing is about seeing as much as it is about putting pencil to paper. Improving your drawing skill will help you notice things about the world that you missed before. I want to improve my drawing skill to better see the world and to better convey ideas to other people. Five Perceptual Skills Drawing can be broken down into 5 perceptual skills.

  1. The perception of edges
  2. The perception of spaces
  3. The perception of relationships
  4. The perception of lights and shadows
  5. The perception of the whole

Each skill has a chapter elaborating on the skill with exercises to develop each skill. Left and Right Brain The main premise of the book is that there is a left and right brain. We need to do things to occupy the left side of the brain, so the right side of the brain can take control. The book doesn’t try to be scientific, because the background of the author is that of an art teacher who knows what works and what doesn’t work instead of that of a scientist. One exercise to be more right brain is to draw something upside down. The reference picture upside down, not drawing with your feet to the ceiling. Materials You need pencil and paper to draw. Each exercise tells you what materials you need to finish the exercise.

Pre-instruction Exercise To know how much your skills have improved, it is helpful to do a pre-instruction exercise to get your current skills. To start, draw

Spend about an hour of uninterrupted time doing so. I’ll pick up the book at a later time when I can devote time to completing the exercises. I might turn the book into lessons into lessons in deliberate practice with daily emails like I did with Navy SEAL training.