Growing up, I have always loved going to art museums and I would constantly jump at any opportunity to see a new exhibit. My love for art developed on its own after watching documentaries, reading books, and visiting museums on my own time. Art was never taken very seriously in my high school so I had never really had the chance to express my love for art in other mediums besides photography, which I had taught myself over the years. I had always appreciated those who had talent and an eye for painting, drawing, designing, as well as other types of art, but I never really put enough time and effort to carry that out myself. After gaining inspiration from my friends and events happening at the time, I decided I loved art enough to minor in it. Although I quickly realized before I could get to the classes I actually wanted to take, I had to take Art 100: Basic Drawing. I had never taken a single art class before and I was very skeptical of whether or not this class would discourage me to pursue my minor in art, but little did I know, this class was going to change everything for me.
My professor made sure to stress the fact that many of the people in our class were coming from all types of art backgrounds with different levels of experience and that everything would be graded on effort, rather than how well the actual project had been executed, which put me a bit at ease. I met multiple friends in the class who were all very different and expressed varying opinions and thoughts, though I started to realize everyone’s goals while taking the class were the same: to express our individuality and not only learn from our professor, but each other as well.
Throughout several weeks of instruction, I could feel myself getting more comfortable drawing. I was motivated and I felt more able to place my imagination onto big sheets of drawing paper. I found myself buying other sketchbooks of my own where I would draw what I wanted in my free time, often including poetry and stories of my own. I had much more frequent bursts of creativity over the period of time where I was taking this drawing class than I ever had in my life. It inspired me to think for myself and create things that I wanted rather than focusing on my audience, or in this case my professor. At the end of the semester, when I collected all of my work, I could see my confidence and skill increase from sheet to sheet. For the first time in my life, I no longer felt like I was just an art lover, but an artist.
Since that drawing class in the Fall 2017 semester, my love for art has gotten more and more profound. From working around different supplies, how basic geometric shapes can become complex, amazing things, expressing myself through pictures, doodles, and images, and much more, I have learned so much. Though, I think the most important lesson I learned while taking basic drawing is that maybe you can’t truly learn to appreciate art until you try to make it yourself.