Response to The Drawing Sessions

Rosie's Feet by Dr. Alice MacLean

Some feedback from our drawing sessions based on Betty Edward’s book, Drawing with the Right Side of the Brain:

I'm not sure what I expected, but have been delighted with the sessions - to have the time just to concentrate on drawing and to find that I can actually produce something halfway respectable.

One thing I've noticed is that focusing on drawing also helps me to focus on research work when needed. The discipline and space needed for both are quite similar, I think.

I liked drawing the model best. I thought it would be difficult, but I really
liked it.

Similarities between research and drawing:

I think there are similarities between the drawing process and analysis in
research. A couple of things - you need to put in the graft to get good
results; and when you make a 'mistake' you can change it and get a better
result, and it's ok to do that. In the research analysis it strikes me
that it also involves a preciseness and a creativeness, whereby if you work with the form and shape of your data as well as the precise content you can develop a really worthwhile, in-depth analysis.

Differences:

I guess research tends to focus on words more, but it's useful to think about how words can be a creative form as well.
CRFR Gallery http://picasaweb.google.com/rosiemgibson02/Drawings

Exploring the Shared Terrain

I've been reading The Sociological Imagination by C.Wright Mills on Caroline's recommendation. Since we've been looking at a lot of art together I thought it was about time I got a bit of the history and context of her field of practice and of CRFR in general. On Art Mills says that although Art can express feelings about 'private troubles and public issues' it cannot formulate them 'with the intellectual clarity required for their understanding or relief''. I have been struck by the intellectual clarity of staff and students I meet. It's invigorating. There is the strong sense of of a craft being refined over time.

When I was at Art School as a mature student studying sculpture, I found myself looking for common characteristics of people in my class. I came to the conclusion that they were a group of young people fascinated by the material world in all it's manifestations (from wood to bronze, to people, to film, to food). Art School was about developing craft in manipulating materials to create meaning.


Can the two practices resource one another? Any other suggestions for reading material?