New Hobby: Drawing 1

Thanks to my friend Vince for the idea.  I've been trying to start a new hobby lately - I'm self-learning how to draw.  I bought a book called "The Draw 50 Way" by Lee J. Ames.  The book provides step-by-step illustrations on how to draw different figures.  Got the book from Powerbooks for only Php145 plus the sketch pad, pencils, and eraser, the "hobby kit" cost me around Php 350.

In the introduction, there is a quote by William Hull: "If we taught children to speak, they'd never learn."  The author expounds by saying, "I believe we often learn best through imitation.  In many of my books
I have advised that mimicry is prerequisite to creativity."  I found this thought-provoking and so let me add my own take on this.  I guess I agree with Ames for now (It is necessary to add the qualifier "for now" because I am a postmodernist for now.  Actually for me the qualifier "for now" lacks postmodern profoundness because it puts my statement in the context of linear time.)  I'll go as far as saying there is no real, absolute originality or creativity.  One's originality or creativity is just a unique collection of imitations.  We start by imitating things, then we tear them apart, deconstruct and reconstruct them, convert and pervert them (borrowing some words from Patti Smith), and mix them all together and present the result as our own.  To make it more "original," we tear imitiations into smaller and smaller pieces and take pieces from more and more imitations.  As I write this, what comes to mind is the way Democritus described his idea of the atom.  He said that if you take a piece of glass (or anything really) and a hammer and you break the glass with the hammer, the pieces will get smaller and smaller until the pieces can no longer be broken apart.  The "unbreakable" pieces are what he called "atomos," the fundamental units of matter.  As with this image in mind, let me add:

"True originality is but a collage of atomic imitations."

I don't know if that made any sense but anyway, back to my new hobby.  I've done two drawings so far - one of a cow (I chose it because the illustrated instructions reminded me of Picasso's process of painting a cubist bull.) and one of a triceratops.  I put pictures of my drawings below as well as a picture of the book.

Cow

Triceratops

The book

I may not have a lot of authority on this (yet) but I actually recommend this book to anyone who wants to self-learn how to draw.  I think this is a good starting point.  I plan to eventually take art classes so I can finally live my dream of becoming an artist (or artiste, as Vince would say).

I plan to draw human figures next.  I'll post updates on this new endeavor.  Best of luck to me!