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conversations.value: a description for a book titled Drawing for the Absolute and Utter Beginner about Silvermine, School, Art with the genre: Arts & Photography, History & Criticism
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conversations.value: the author is a faculty member at Silvermine School of Art in New Canaan, CT. Her Absolute and Utter Beginner courses and workshops geared toward beginning artists have been popular for 20 years. She lives in Ridgefield, CT.
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conversations.value: the first three paragraphs for this book
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conversations.value: Drawing for the Absolute and Utter Beginner
  As enthusiastic as they are to begin drawing, beginners are often hesitant to put that first mark on paper. A student of mine described her feeling to me quite vividly: "My nerves were raw as I sat with virgin white paper and clutched pencil that first lesson. I felt that if I could avoid bringing the two in contact with each other, I could escape failure."
  Nerves are a natural part of starting something new and exciting, and that's not all bad. Anxiety provides us with psychic rocket fuel, the adrenaline that pushes us to leap into new territory with quickened responses and heightened alertness. If you're feeling a bit jittery right now, take some scrap paper and simply scribble, mark, doodle, procrastinate, and "mess up the paper" until you have burned off some of that nervous energy.
  Avoid doing a verbal play-by-play while you draw. Instead, try to empty your mind of words. You'll find it easier to draw if you allow time for nonverbal, visual processing.
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conversations.value: two more paragraphs
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conversations.value: Once you've made your choice, be nice to your brush; it will last longer with some basic tender care. Never leave it full of paint or wash. Keep it in water, hairs down, while working—but don't leave it that way for a prolonged period, or the hairs will curve. (If you forget and that does happen, dip the end in boiling water for a second or two to reshape hairs.) Wash brushes after each use with warm water and mild soap, then leave them lying flat or in a jar to dry, hairs up.
  Before we make a wash sampler, let's concentrate on making a wash. First, place all your supplies on the table on your drawing-hand side, with your water jar filled. Squeeze a one-inch line of the black paint on your palette. If you're using freezer paper as your palette, tape it down so it won't curl up. About a 12" square piece is a good size.
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conversations.value: the last four paragraphs. Start with the sentence 'An aesthetic profile can appear when you have a body of work to review, which is the basis of our final exercise'.
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conversations.value: An aesthetic profile can appear when you have a body of work to review, which is the basis of our final exercise. That doesn't mean that what you see reflects who you are as an artist forever, but it will give you a sense of who you are as an artist now. The picture literally emerges and develops with your skills—if you simply keep going.
  For the same reason that we began with upside-down drawing in Chapter 1, this upside-down viewing helps you to bypass literal identities and focus more on those underlying aesthetic components of line, shape, and value revealed by your personal interpretation. "We don't see things as they are, we see them as we are," said writer Anaïs Nin. It's that unique inner aesthetic to look for in your art. In doing so, it can be instructive to write down your findings and goals. For instance, what medium would you like to continue exploring? Do you prefer drawing faces or still lifes?
  Studying the work of other artists to find the kinds of consistencies you've looked for in your own work is also a useful exercise. On the opposite page, you'll find a group of drawings by a student who is a not-quite beginner, whose work provides a vivid example of the mysterious consistencies of inner style that emerge over time, as you will find in your own work.
  Examine the five drawings on the opposite page to see if you can locate those aesthetic aspects that echo throughout this representative grouping of a student's work. Then compare your findings with the answers given in the box below. Consistent with our upside-down mode, they are printed that way to give you a chance to find your own answers before consulting these.