How to teach a programmer to draw

In general, I was not going to draw or discover the creator in myself. I wanted to come hear about art history, learn about composition and color theory. Artists are special people, and you need to have a special talent to pick up a brush. If I ever drew, then with crayons on the pavement a house and a train for my own child.

But the leadership of our publishing house came up with a brilliant idea. If among us there are employees with art education and those who want to learn how to draw, why not bring them together in an empty room at the end of the working day? And here we are: a few programmers, a recruiting manager (who has long dreamed of painting in oils), a proofreader, a brand manager for a magazine, a project manager, and a system administrator. And the head of web projects, Tanya Boldyreva, who has been sitting at an easel since she was six, graduated from an art university and completely disinterestedly wants to make creators of us, teach us how to draw. With this, we will begin our report from the training.

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Like an arrow

At the first lesson, we sat on chairs in a semicircle and peacefully listened to a lecture on Escher’s graph. The offer to get paper and start drawing was a complete surprise. At the same moment, one of the members of our team just … fled. Everyone else had to take a sheet of wonderful thick A3 paper and a black marker. And no pencils or erasers! Everyone had to depict the idea of ​​movement, balance, and also create fractal graphics in the spirit of Escher. There was silence in the room for several minutes. Panic, as it turned out, was not only me. The white, clean expanse of the sheet attracted the eye, and pity was read in many glances.

Graphics is called the art of black and white, but it is not the art of contrast, as it might seem at first glance. Rather, it requires the ability to highlight the main thing, the essence, and designate it with a single line. “Just as an archer accurately marks his target, pulls the bowstring and releases the arrow, so the writer must concentrate, imagine the shape of the characters, and then, with self-confidence, move strongly and decisively with the brush.” So said the Chinese Chang Ye. It turned out that drawing is not relaxation (as I thought), but a real brainstorming session. In a couple of minutes, cave paintings from school textbooks, engravings I had seen, illustrations for books, some vague ideas and images flashed through my head. Until suddenly I realized that I could start, and this line would be solid.

Are you afraid of a clean slate? Do something wrong, mess something up, or even just start? I am afraid of many things, but the white sheet of paper only arouses curiosity: what will happen this time? Sometimes it turns out to be nonsense. But I have a brand new thick sketchbook, and I just tear off a new sheet from it without having time to be upset.

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• “I drew the globe of Borovsk”

Set unrealistic goals!

In the next lesson, we were already going to draw a landscape on the move. The guys brought watercolors, oils and acrylics. Reproductions of Roerich and photographs of mountains served as nature for us. There were many of them, everyone chose what he liked, what he really wanted to draw. We are amazingly different.

For nature, I chose a picture that I once took in San Marino: incredible space and light, a complete feeling of freedom … I looked at the photo and clearly understood that I did not want to draw. The beauty of photography is to capture a beautiful moment that will never happen again. I caught him, and it won’t get any better. In addition, it takes an hour to draw, and I do everything quickly, even at home in the kitchen I light several burners and cook all the dishes at once at the same time.

In the meantime, people were sitting around me who clearly showed familiarity with the subject. They were holding the pencil correctly, shading something. For some reason it didn’t bother me. It’s probably a matter of method. Set yourself unrealistic goals, and then you will not be afraid. To start drawing like Roerich right away, bypassing all the intermediate stages – there is definitely something in this. The teacher of the famous Bauhaus and the author of color theory Johannes Iten wrote that subjectively each of us has his own theme and his own color, each will have his own writing technique. You can not give the same template tasks to all students. The student will try to depict a boring topic or a topic that is far from his worldview purely technically, but for this he still does not have enough knowledge, and the result will turn out to be doubtful. This is why so many drop out.

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• “Why do I draw scary pictures?”

So, into battle. You can’t draw on the table, otherwise the perspective is distorted, and I had to draw right on the wall, on a sheet of paper pinned to it. Terribly uncomfortable, I tell you. I outlined the outlines of the hills and fancifully wrapped flags on the mast, as best I could draw two figures. But in the Italian expanses there were still many shades and details. There was already quite a bit of time left, and I was comparing everything, whether I had correctly transferred them to paper (like any proofreader who is used to strictly checking the facts). The insight came suddenly, when I suddenly realized that my picture should not repeat exactly what is shown in the picture. She can be anything at all. I joyfully told everyone: “Roerich didn’t paint details either!”, took a thick brush of the “wrong” size, bought the day before at the Skrepka store, and drew a juicy, thick blue horizon line. I would like to say that I plunged back into my childhood, but there was no drawing in our school due to the lack of a teacher. It was the delight of the baby from the fact that he leaves a trace: “I am!” – the joy of the purity of color and because I “caught” these flying lines and space on paper.

In the remaining ten minutes, the picture was ready. I felt like I was there, inside. And suddenly I remembered that my picture was actually unsuccessful! The diaphragm failed me then, and while I was getting the camera, people managed to leave, others came, and the wind was replaced by complete calm. I completely forgot about it. But if you take the colors, you can return that moment as it was: not fallen limply, but huge, half the sky, flags of a small state that did not allow itself to be conquered even by Napoleon, but did not get involved in a war with anyone.

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• They mended their relationship with time

Why should I draw this bottle?

Still life with wine and two glasses “in Soviet style” was almost an improvisation. As Tanya said, did the bottle left after the Sabantuy of one of her colleagues knew that she would have such an honor. In general, she stood modestly on the office table against a dull background of an indefinite brown color and evoked sadness.

What a strange painting it is – a still life: it makes you admire a copy of those things, the originals of which you do not admire. Pascal said it. In our country, for now, a simple combination of five objects has shown obstinacy: they stubbornly lean to the left, someone did not fit one glass, and the second bottle, which was supposed to lie, did not lie down, but looked like it was hanging in the air, like a magician. In addition, in my case, she slightly raised her head, as if looking back at other objects.

But most importantly, it was necessary to decide: why draw this bottle at all? This is not a landscape that pleases the soul of an office worker, not juicy colors for which we are hungry, namely, “dead nature”. It would be nice to have a full, but empty bottle – where is the life in it? What is the point of still life paintings? In the pictures, where objects come together in the absence of a person?

With these thoughts, having finished the pencil sketch, I left until the next class. And in a strange way, this ghostly design stuck in my memory, and from time to time I returned to it: what color will it be? To draw a still life, you need to understand the nature of things, to feel their essence and inner joy from the fact that they exist. Leonardo da Vinci said that “a painter who makes senseless sketches is like a mirror that reflects the objects opposed to it, without having knowledge of them.” Boring colors, but what’s stopping me from finding others?

And so the next Thursday, the four of us settled down at the same table, took out paints and painted completely different bottles. I got a cheerful still life (like Pirosmani, the only thing missing is fish, the guys said). Wine-coloured reflections appeared on the bottle, as if it had a memory. Sasha’s bottle color and brown wall turned out to be incredibly appetizing. Kostya turned out to be a real male drawing, and the colors on it were definitely with character. Olina and Dasha’s bottles stood confidently and with dignity, so there was no doubt that drawing them was the most important and necessary thing. At Irina, all the items comfortably settled side by side and looked like an illustration for a children’s fairy tale.

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• An acute desire to return meaning to life

Having discovered such mountains of meaning in one simple object, you involuntarily look at the world with great respect. Seeing how everything is connected with each other, you do not want to destroy this connection. During the hour that we draw an object, we examine it very carefully. This is some new, unaccustomed way of looking – not glancing over the many houses-lanes familiar to the pain, not lowering your eyes, scanning the next fellow travelers in the subway. In my opinion, we were engaged in the most real meditation, only active – “feel this object, incarnate in it, convey its essence.”

Then we went to the Pushkin Museum, and a strange thing: it used to be beautiful, for which I came here to meet. Now each picture for me was like a look at the beautiful world of one of those who picked up a brush. And we immediately wanted to draw. Don’t even try. We discussed how the strokes were applied and the color was chosen. People gathered around us and listened with interest. Standing at the bus stop, I looked at the sparrow and wondered how many shades of gray there were on his cheeks. Unrealistic sunsets arose from somewhere on the way home from work. Beautiful pine trees began to appear where they, in fact, grew before all these years.

In fact, we are adults and are engaged in some kind of nonsense. We are looking for beauty where you will not immediately notice it, and if not, we will add a generous hand “on our own”. Some moments in the choice of color or theme sometimes evoke pain for someone, and the psychotherapist would have found something to say here. But we came just to learn how to draw. When we discuss each other’s work, we all sincerely like it. And the amazing thing is, they like their own too.

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• Teaching creativity – is it possible?

Vladimir Ermolov, system administrator

“The first job caused nothing but difficulties. Positive – at least, only shortcomings in skills. The need for training. And there are no thoughts. Because during artistic work I usually have no thoughts – almost a meditative state. This is what attracts creativity.”

Maya Pavlova, programmer

“What I felt: the delight of mixing colors. And awe and awkwardness when you do about the first twenty strokes. Then just enjoy. Why I wanted to draw: I would clarify for myself why I wanted to draw with PAINTS, because this is a process of creation and an opportunity to discover something new in yourself. And also I wanted to get away from something “terrible” and show potential viewers something good. I drew not only for myself, but also for the audience.

Olga Unguryan, recruitment manager

“I love nature very much. I wanted to paint this light in the fields, the gold of the tree, like Van Gogh’s, when the wheat fields glow from the inside. The most difficult and scary thing is to start working with paints, apply the first strokes on a still white canvas with pencil markings. The first strokes seem so strange, unnatural, but then this process of mixing paints, applying them with bold, bright strokes is very addictive. 2,5 hours fly by like 10 minutes! It’s great that all the people participating in our workshops are getting closer and understanding each other better. I get a huge positive charge from these meetings. Both from a brush and paints, and from communication.

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