Negative Space
One of my sisters studied art as a minor in college. She was in a drawing class, working with charcoals.
Standing back from the piece she was working on, she puzzled over what it needed. It was so close to the model being rendered…but something was missing.
Her instructor saw her looking at the page and sauntered over to take a look. He too, looked at it for a long while. He cocked his head and squinted.
“Ah, I see. May I?” The instructor said, reaching toward the paper
My sister nodded.
He took his thumb and wiped away a small potion of the charcoal.
Suddenly, the figure came alive. The drawing went from flat to dimensional.
Nothing needed to be added. She had only to find the bit that was in the way and remove it.
Truly seeing like this requires masterful perspective.
I enjoy the process of learning to paint and draw, and I find that perspective is one of the more difficult things to master. People who are good at this can create an incredible drawing in only a few strokes of a pen. They leave out the superfluous. They eliminate the unnecessary. They represent the essence.
In my sketchbook, I make many attempts to render what I see. I use unerasable mediums, which means many layers may accumulate to create an approximation of my reference photo. When something doesn’t look right, I add more. It was only recently that I began to think about the negative spaces in artworks.
Negative space is comprised of the shapes that give a boundary to the focus of the work. In fact, some instructors urge students to focus, not on the object they want to render, but rather on the shapes around the object.
One way to do this effectively, is to take whatever reference picture you are using and turn it upside down. The brain, confronted with an upside-down picture, has a difficult time interpreting the forms. It gives up trying to explain everything, and simply allows you to see the shapes. The same photo right-side up is recognizable, and the brain gets to work naming things and trying to overlay meaning.
The technique is one I was taught in middle school from a book called Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain. That trick of turning the reference picture upside-down confuses the storytelling left-brain and permits the more conceptual right brain to take over.
So, what if the same is true in the picture of our life? What if everything is already there, but we just can’t see it underneath so many layers? What if the left brain is so busy telling us stories that the right brain can’t reveal the shapes that create the picture?
Diving into the spiritual world, this theme came up again and again. That each individual is whole and complete within themselves. We don’t always feel this way, so we look for external things to add in. We layer on money, accomplishments, and identities.
As long as we keep looking at the picture in the same way, we will think its still missing something. We will be compelled to keep adding.
But step back, take a look from a different angle, stand on your head if you have to. Suddenly, you might see where you already shine. It just takes uncovering the masterpiece from all of the layers. Peeling back the stories to view your essential nature.
Everything is already there. We are enough in our existence.
