I've written before about the boy-child's love of drawing and his emerging creative streak. It has been an interesting journey to be sure. For as parents we were totally surprised by this, dare I say it "talent". As he is our eldest child we had no good reference point for what type of pictures a child of his age would or could draw...and to be honest he went from scratching on a page one week to drawing well formed pictures the next when he was about 3. He is turning 5 on Sunday.This brings us to some important decisions though as parents. Firstly and most importantly how do we encourage him to keep his love of drawing? He draws ALL the time and uses it as a way of consolidating his learning and capturing extraordinary detail that he is able to take in all around him. His eyes are continually open to the detail of life, and in particular the colour of life.
Secondly, how as parents do we facilitate a creative life for him and for us as a family? By this I mean in part making it safe and OK to chose a creative career option in life. This one is close to my heart because as a child (and from a very young age) I designed houses over and over, to the point of near obsession....but did I become an architect - must to my frustration, NO! I chose the "safe" path, determined by what I was "good" at, rather than what I "loved". The man of the house is one of the lucky ones, his work and his passion are the same thing.
I've been doing some research in this area and will post more about this next week, but I'd love to hear your thoughts.
BTW- that picture above is of a church inspired by the one that they moved on the SBS show "Monster Moves" ...made equally incredible by the fact that it was drawn about three weeks after he saw the show and also that he has never been inside a church!
After 17 years of parenthood, re-training as a landscape architect at 30 and teaching design undergraduates, here's what I know:
ReplyDelete1) young adult students never talk about their education ie schools, they talk ALL the time about their family and home-life (you've got that aced by the looks of things)
2)you aren't a lost cause yourself - retraining opportunities are boundless and once your children area a little older, you can dip your toe in if you like
3)my oldest child had a perfect steiner childhook bursting with creative opportunities and now refers to those many years as her 'crafty prison'. Our son has had a stick, some sand and too much Thunderbirds Are Go and runs rings around his sister in every creative realm.
Make of that what you will :)
Finally, I can only say that children are like the stock market - whatever theory you have about the stock market, the stock market doesn't share.
Love him (which you obviously do) and buy him the best quality pencils you can afford and I think you are on top of this issue - totally!
gorgeous drawing - you little guys has the most amazing eye for detail! I especially like those windows =) x
ReplyDeletesorry, please pretend my comment makes sense in actual ENGLISH hehe - is hard to type with tea in one hand, resting on one elbow, under a cat while watching wife swap!! hehe
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