2.1.1 Abstract Picture of the School and Surroundings
At the very start in my drawing lessons I was asked to draw which country I came from, I was given a world map, black pens with different thicknesses and white paper made of different matter. I had to draw my country but I was only able to draw a very abstract version of this as I was unable to control the pen to do what I wanted it to do. I then was asked to draw a birds eye view of the school and its surroundings from a picture I was given and found the same problem as when drawing the country I am from, Holland. I discovered however that with some pens it was easier to draw than with others. I preferred a thin pen where the ink was flowing out easily without having to apply alot of pressure because of my disability living with cerebral palsy, this was a crucial finding.
In the next lesson I had we experimented with different colored paper. I was asked to draw my own skeleton, how I would envision it to look. With an average size white pencil I drew on to black paper. I discovered that a white pencil with a black background made it easier for me to see the contrast as I have trouble with seeing depth when using white paper and a led pencil. Black paper itself is usually a color I hate as I connect the color with death. In the institutions I grew up in we were ordered to wear black clothing when there was a death, at least once a week we had no choice but to wear the black clothing. I did however try to fight against my finding, I tried all the colors of the rainbow but they all brought me back to black. The black gave my eyes less tension and more relaxation and the depth of the drawing I was seeking.
After my astonishing finding with the use of black paper I thought about how I could find other solutions to other problems I had regarding drawing and painting. The problem of not being able to control my pen very well was the next challenge I wished to overcome. I found that my pen was to difficult to hold, I needed a thin pen but with a thick handle. An average pen or pencil is thin on point and thin on the handle or thick on point and thick on the handle. I discussed the problem with my teacher and we came up a way of getting round this. My teacher suggested a recipe for making a mould from salt dough which I had previously used for other art work but I had not thought of it as a solution for my drawing problem, we used 2 cups of flour, one cup of salt and half a cup of water. We moulded it around a pencil and tried out different variations of shapes and sizes while it was soft to find out the best model for my grip. There was no oven available at the time to make the mould solid so we had to wait for over a week for it to air dry. If we had use of an oven the drying time would of been considerably less taking only 20 minutes at a temperature of 250°C.
Once the mould had hardened it turned out to be a very helpful tool. In the lesson that followed I wanted to draw on a larger scale. My teacher fixed a large piece of black drawing paper to the wall and gave me a bamboo stick attached to the mould with a white pencil taped at the end. I then proceeded to have fun and play around with the new tool without creating form. I found that I could draw better with my right hand than with my left but I was surprised that I could draw with my left hand at all. It was an important discovery as I used it later on when I started painting using the same method but with a paint brush. It gave my other hand a rest and time for recovery and it also gave a different pressure on the paper, thinner lines, a dotted effect and therefore a different feeling to the painting.
The feeling of freedom was awakened in me, a door that had been locked for years had finally been opened. My heart was dancing with joy, a feeling I wanted to put on paper. Gravity I found had a big part to play in the painting, it helped me draw lines from top to bottom, diagonally, straighter than I had ever done before. It was a very powerful moment one I will never forget.
It was clear to me that I needed to exercise more in between my lessons, I decided to do this during my physio appointments at the Inselspital. We started to hang black paper on the wall at physio and also started to paint there. I tried to create a christmas tree but was not able to accomplish my goal, I gave up wanting to create form so I let the abstraction create form by itself. I found this to be an amazing technique because it meant that my body had a story to tell which was not created by my will. Animals and people started to appear that I never thought I had a connection too, for example an elephant, a bird and mountains, a dream landscape that was growing and growing by the minute from out of my inner world. While I was painting the physiotherapist was exercising the arm that was not active as there was alot of tension in it. I think the tension was there because I had to concentrate on the right arm which was painting. We looked at releasing this tension, sometimes she supported the active arm with gentle touch which is also used in the Alexander Technique.
