Drawing and representative art

Drawing and representative art

The exercises which we have described as “drawing” actually were intended to train the hand so that it would be ready to write. These exercises were taken as a part of that complex preparation by means of which a child’s small hand, still uncertain in its movements, could execute that minute kind of drawing that constitutes drawing.

In the case of writing, this synthesis of “explosive,” and at times it may be found combined with other syntheses of a more general character.

By itself it is neither drawing nor writing, but rather an introduction to both of the one and the other.

They compose geometrical figures, which they then fill out holding the pencil in a special way, or they fill in with coloured pencil figures that have already been outlined.

The so-called “free-drawing” has no place in Montessori system. And yet, despite this fact, our children draw figures and ornamental motifs that are much more clear and harmonious than those strange scrawling known as “free drawings”.

In Montessori, we do not give lessons in drawing or in modelling, and yet, many of our children know how to draw flowers, birds, landscapes, and even imaginary scenes in an admirable way.

We must therefore conclude that the preparation of the hand and of the senses naturally assists both writing and expressive drawing.

In Montessori class we do not teach a child to draw by having him draw but by giving him the opportunity to prepare his means of expression. A great aid to free drawing since, being either inefficacious or incomprehensible, it encourages a child to continue. This prepares his hand by developing his muscular control.

In fact, interfering in a work already completed is always an obstacle. It interrupts the inner drive for expression as can happen when direct means are used to teach drawing.

We call our system for teaching how to draw and write an “indirect method”. When they are taught in this way, children become more and more capable of expressing themselves.

This does not mean, however, that progress in drawing continues indefinitely as it does in writing, or that the drawings, indicate that the child will all become artists.

Doctor Revesz, a psychologist who has specialized in the study of art, states, as a result of her own experience: “There are children who, as they develop their powers of expression and become more sophisticated, give up drawing completely, either because they have lost interest in it or lack artistic talent, or because they concentrate on matters of another character.”

This has been thoroughly studied from a psychological point of view in a child who was a real musical prodigy. His drawings give obvious proof of what we have just indicated.

This may be the reason why our children abandon drawing for some time when they become passionately interested in writing. But, if a child is endowed with an artistic spirit it takes complete possession of him and makes of him an artist, as in case of Giotto.

Briefly, the instinct for the self-expression looks for a means to manifest itself; and thus may be in at least one of two different ways. One of these is through writing. Which is used to express ideas; and the other is through representative art.

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