Log0008

drawing

The best thing I saw all day at the Museum of Contemporary Art had to have been on the bottom floor. It wasn’t the exhibit that caught me, but its observers. After walking all the other floors, we found ourselves entering into a large room with just two other people. A mother and her young daughter. The two sat on opposite ends of the room. The mother was on a bench sketching one of the mounted paintings. She hardly noticed our presence. And the young girl on the other side of the room sat cross legged on the cold concrete floor in front of a Jabberwocky-esque looking sculpture. She would look up, observe, then back down to her sketchbook to lay the marks. The subtle grin on her face was fully content. 

She was so dialed in and fixated on her work. It feels wrong to even call it “work”, because to her it’s really not work. It’s all play. There is no larger purpose, no audience to impress, no technique to grasp, no goal at all. It reminded me how you don’t have to feel inspired as a 5-year-old to draw. You’re not waiting for the muse to strike. You just draw. Simple. You draw what you see, what you feel or what you dream. You just draw. No special paper or pencil necessary. No call of distraction, no, you are just drawing, and that has your full attention. 

I appreciated her industriousness, but adding to that, the girl had caught on to a core idea of a place like this. The value isn’t gotten from walking room to room, but instead by sitting there, looking at the same piece, and seeing it through your eyes. To bring in your own meaning and story. I don’t think the little girl had any intention to do this, but that’s often the point, to take stock of it all without forcing the answers. 

Her attention was there, on the paper, on the subject, back to the paper. Captivated by this odd-looking statue, I bet she spent more time looking at it than any other attendee all year. It’s one of the difficult things in a gallery – to be locked in, to observe. A playful drawing can be a great window into this. It supplements the boredom and makes it more bearable. 

We both wanted to see what she was drawing. My wife asked if she could see her pictures, shyly the young girl revealed her page. Words of encouragement were returned. Then the girl’s confidence grew and she grinned. I stood there and watched the exchange. Wishing the girl would take those words to heart. Likely she wouldn’t. At some point we age out of it, stop drawing. And eventually, if we’re lucky, we might be one of the rare few who returns. 

The scene inspired me. I’m fine being inspired by a 5-year-old girl. Especially one so captivated by her drawing. We all knew this lesson at some point, then almost all of us forgot it, complicated it, toyed with nuanced excuses. But really the answer is simple: just draw.