drawanyway.com

Certainly, all the best artists would tell you that it’s a good thing to occasionally let accidents happen, and see where they lead you. Actually, drawing is, in a strange way, an attempt to strike a balance between being in perfect control of your media, and introducing a note of reckless abandon.

Yes, many years of practice will ensure that you know precisely how your line is going to turn out, and yes, that is to be admired. But some degree of surrender is also much valued by those in the know. Just as jazz music is at its best when improvised, free, with the players seeing where the music takes them, so your pictures will be improved by handing over some elements to chance.

It doesn’t end there, though. Suppose you ‘accidentally’ come up with a wonderful picture, due to the fact that you let your hand wander, and created an effect you like? Well then, the real art is in identifying what you did, and replicating it the next time you want to. That’s not necessarily an easy thing, either.

My most recent example happened on Photoshop, unsurprisingly, since I do so much artwork on there these days. Actually, drawing on a computer really lends itself to the experimental approach, since there are fewer penalties if you go wrong: the ‘undo’ button is right there.

In this case, I selected an area I wanted to colour in with the magic wand. Somehow, after doing so, I didn’t let go the mouse, and I accidentally dragged my selection down the screen. I didn’t realise you could do that with a selected area. The result was that I could colour in a slightly ‘offset’ area, as if, when printing, one colour hadn’t quite registered with the others. You must know the kind of effect I mean - you used to see it all the time, both purposefully and by accident, where, say, red tones were slightly misaligned on a blue background.

Now, remember what I said about the key to making use of your mistakes being the ability to replicate them at will? Well, I tried, and the result was the image above (I tend to only allow myself one shot at my Draw Anyway image each night, as a) that’s part of the point of Draw Anyway, and b) I wouldn’t have any time to myself in the evening if I were drawing multiple pictures). Which does not really replicate the effect at all. I told you it was hard.