Almost everything in the world around you started with an idea, a design, a drawing.
Drawing is the way artists, engineers, scientists and many more figure out how something looks and how it works. Have you ever taken a look at Leonardo de Vinci’s drawings from around 1490 for a flying machine? He may not have created the airplane we know today, but others like the Wright Brothers studied his drawings and built upon them.
Biomechanical engineers study systems to solve biological or medical problems. They create drawings to study the processes and forms. Mechanical drawings are then created to explain how to manufacture their creation.
Business cards to beautiful murals and every birthday card you’ve ever purchased were drawn by an artist or illustrator. Every piece of clothing you wear came from a pattern that someone drew. Every bit of text you’ve ever read is part of a font that was designed and drawn by a typographer.
Drawing can also be a way to calm our minds. It can be used as a form of meditation or in therapy.
Many times people tell me they can’t draw. Drawing something can seem like a daunting task. One of my favorite ways to draw is tangle drawing which breaks a large piece down into manageable pieces filled with patterns. Too many people focus on the whole and are overwhelmed. Tangling is a great way to reorient our way of looking at things. Anyone can do this no matter your skill level.
The basic principles are as old as the history of art and ritual. Many of the patterns have evolved from symbols, designs, and patterns of numerous cultures like Mayan, Celtic, and American Indian. When tangling, there is no planning and you allow the lines and shapes to emerge as you go. It creates a wonderful discovery process and people are always surprised what they were able to create in the end from these little pieces.
Draw a few lines on a piece of paper, separating it into smaller sections. Fill each section with a structured pattern. It can be as simple as filling the section with circles. Continue filling the other sections with other patterns. Those doodles and scribbles you did as a child in the margins of your school notebooks, let them fill the sections. The repetition of pattern is very soothing and meditative. If you want to explore some more complex patterns, there are a wealth of examples and tutorials online.
Try it again and instead of drawing just lines to separate the sections draw ribbons (two lines with a space in between). That ribbon now can have a pattern of its own. Ribbons can cross over one another and start giving depth to your drawings. Adding a little shading under the ribbons and they start to look three dimensional.
My drawings are pretty advanced and usually include painting as well. I enjoy discovering what shape and direction the drawing will take. There are never mistakes with this type of drawing, just opportunities.
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