Back in high school I remember two individuals who had an incredible gift.  They could draw.  It was so effortless for them that it seemed like they could do it in their sleep.  For me and the rest of us who didn’t have such a talent we were just resigned to think that it truly was a gift.  And for as young as they were I can’t deny that it wasn’t.  But many years later I would find out that there was hope, that I could also draw like my high school friends.

     It happened at a local mall while browsing through a bookstore.  I came across the book, Drawing On The Right Side Of The Brain by Betty Edwards.  If anything, the title itself is what peaked my interest but when I picked it up and looked at the first chapter what I saw next was even more interesting.  The author had a showcase of before and after drawings from her students.  It was amazing to see the transformation.  Obviously this was the selling point for me.

     The central theme of the book, as the title states, is learning how to shift to the creative right hemisphere of the brain or to the “R-mode”, as the author describes it, when drawing.  There is extensive background information on how the brain works helping you to understand why initially it may be hard to draw since the left hemisphere or the “L-mode” dominates.  It is this crucial shift that allows us to make the leap to being a great artist.  The author presents some very fascinating exercises where you look at images in the book or where you pick your own and then you draw it with the image upside down.  The reason, the L-mode dominates but with the image inverted the left hemisphere becomes confused unable to process what it sees, and thus, the shift to the R-mode.  Another group of exercises involves looking at an object and drawing it without looking at the paper!  Ultimately the goal is to draw exactly what you see without any interference or critical thinking from the L-mode.  You can look at something that you want to draw and at first it may seem daunting but that is your left hemisphere talking.  It is unable to process as much information at a given time as compared to the right hemisphere.  Once you make the shift, how complicated the object you want to draw doesn’t matter anymore.  From my own experience, shifting into the R-mode is like slipping into a calm meditative state.  It is quite pleasant.

     There is much more I can say about this book and there are many more different exercises but rather than diving any deeper I thought why not prove how good the techniques are with my own before and after drawings.  One of the first exercises was to do a self portrait so you could gauge your progress once you finished the book.  Yes, I never actually redid my portrait like I should have but the two drawings that I have here definitely show that the exercises in Betty Edward’s book do work.