The Big Draw

Last night at dinner Jess told me about a program that began in the U.K. in 2000 called "The Big Draw." The goal of the program is to utilize the month of October to bring people together through the act of drawing, and to foster human creativity through worldwide art projects and a rejection of the term "I can't draw."

In an art class I took during my freshmen year of college I learned that our artistic skills remain at the level of the time we stop producing art. In other words, as little kids we all draw, but by the end of grade school when mandatory art classes are dropped from our curriculums, many of us stop utilizing our artistic powers leaving them stagnate, and perhaps even causing them to regress. Not that we all need to be master artists, and by no means is that the goal of "The Big Draw," but as Malcolm Gladwell, (referencing scientific studies by neurologist Daniel Levitin,) explains in his book Outliers, 10,000 hours are required to become a master, or expert in anything.

Anyway, the initiative sounds amazing and has received international acclaim. I believe that The Drawing Center of NYC participated in 2009, does anyone else know of other NY institutions that took part? If you are interested in learning more about "The Big Draw," or in registering your organization / institution, visit the website of the Campaign For Drawing at www.campainfordrawing.org .