Drawing From Life: Interpreting and Translating

On YouTube, I have a wonderful bunch of subscribers. I am so grateful for that, and for the connection with so many people from all over the globe! Often, I get questions through YouTube, that are really great, and today I’d like to share one, because the person who posted this question probably isn’t the only one wondering about the subject.

Question asked via YouTube:

“I'm starting to draw from life, which is something I've had a really difficult time getting myself to even try. The results have been surprisingly good. I feel the anxiety about drawing from life slowly melting away. I have a question. By ignoring perspective like you sometimes do in your videos, in technical terms, are you making a slight abstraction of your reference? I'm new to this visual art stuff and don't fully understand the terminology ike an artist might. The colloquial meaning of the word abstract seems very ill defined. People seem to think it just means nonsense or randomness, but I know it goes deeper than that. Thanks again”

My response:

Yes, I think you could call it an abstraction, but I see it more as an interpretation and a translation. I aim to capture the vibe and the feeling of the place, not to create a perfect representation of what I see. I like "editing" in my drawings too, meaning: when a tree is in view, but it would fall off my composition when I would stay true to all the elements that I see, then I just draw it anyway. I "move it" closer into my composition. It might be much more to the left in the street for example, but if I think it should be included in the drawing for my "story", my interpretation, I can totally decide to do that - it's a drawing after all and I can do what I want. I stay true to the colours that I see, mostly, but some artists play with color much more. A grey building can be pink in your drawing - leafs can be purple. I think it's all very exciting how creative you can get when drawing.

I hope this snippet from the many conversations that are happening on YouTube, gives you some insights and encouragement to be playful and brave in your own sketchbook practice.

I selected a few drawings below from my archive that are very alive and expressive because of ignoring/distorting perspective.

Exaggerated perspective with the drink in the foreground, and I “moved” those umbrellas into my drawing (while in my view they were much further to the left)

I moved the bicycle more up because I wanted to include it to describe this street - it was lower in my view. I also shortened the lamp post to fit it all. And I managed to draw the buildings in a fish-eye perspective.

The drawing is drawn completely out of proportion and perspective, which almost makes it dance on the page.

The background elements are not true to reality - I wanted to fit the people between the two girls in the foreground, and so they are much higher up on the floor than the people in the background on the left - but it’s still believable.