This past week (sorry folks) we studied the chapter on Painting, Sketching, and Sculpturing. I'll be honest, when I first read this chapter three years ago; I literally drew in a breath of air, prepared to hate it and to hate myself for not having any hand drawing talent. By the end of the chapter, I was enthralled and couldn't wait for more. The reason why? Mrs. Schaeffer included some of her own hand artwork- stick figure illustrations of her husband's sermons. She would illustrate the sermons to help keep the attention of her children and subsequent grandchildren on topic. We all discussed the merits of this, and at the encouragement of my group, I gave it a whirl this past Sunday. It was actually liberating- although not worthwhile to save for posterity!
We discussed the challenge of illustrating a favorite verse, if for no other reason than to challenge your mind into thinking of the words in a new way. Imagine illustrating part of Psalm 23:
"He leads me beside still waters". Would you use a hand being held? By a lake, a stream, ... what would the sky look like?
My friend Caryn (practicing graphic designer and aspiring children's book illustrator) was our guest speaker. She shared that one of her earliest starts in drawing were the old tracing paper coloring books. I had completely forgotten about those! One of the challenges that I have given to all the speakers is to have a $5 entry- how can someone who knows absolutely nothing about this art begin practicing on $5 or less. So Caryn's advice? A simple pencil. Just draw. Along with Mrs. Schaeffer, she suggested just drawing some of the every day. A funny face in a letter, scrollwork on a list, food images on your menu plan.
Our favorite quote from this chapter was "Ideas carried out stimulate more ideas."
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