The Drawing Projects: An Exploration of the Language of Drawing Paperback – August 2, 2011

I love this book! I use it as a resource for teaching college level foundation drawing. The projects take an art therapy approach that is perfect for current teens and young adults. This book covers the basics in fun and innovative ways with lots of room for adapting and expanding. It is very well organized and includes short readings that enhance the lessons.

Am currently working on the drawing projects in this book and find them innovative. challenging, and eye-opening - and I've been teaching drawing on the college level for nearly 20 years. If your drawings are good, maybe even excellent, but you feel they are formulaic or just uninspired, the "assignments" in this book will get you out of the rut. I'm exploring new media and ways to see things and am truly enjoying it - and better yet -learning. Feels like I'm a kid again, trying things I have never tried and thrilled with the results. May use a couple of the projects in my own classes.As others have said before, the challenge for the artist is to draw what you see, not what you know. The ability to see like an artist is so much more useful than the knowledge of stylized symbols, or the technical specifications of all the different media, or art history and names and styles of famous artists. This book get's you out of all that the logical left brain garbage, and into that wonderful state of flow inside your right brain. While the projects include some of the pioneering strategies of Betty Edwards and Drawing from the Right Side of the Brain, "Drawing Projects" takes Edwards a few steps forward and offers more advanced and involved project to evolve your drawing.Finally, perhaps one of the best things about this book, it treats drawing as valuable and finished media, not some sort of preliminaries to painting. Inspiring and useful book, with over 20 distinct and different projects. Even if you only gain from a single project, (and you will find more than one) this book is well worth the cost allowing you to take your your drawings in fresh challenging directions.

Art lovers, buy this book. It's an extraordinary piece just to have lying around . . . expensive paper, beautiful color pictures of modern drawings, and amazing interviews and essays from working artists. You can flip to any page and pick up wonderful passages next to really thrilling images.If you're an artist, this book is even better because it's more or less a workshop to develop your drawing eye. The theoretical and philisophical ideas will develop your knowledge and your critical viewpoint, and the artist features are almost like having a mentorship program, which is especially nice if you don't have other artists to speak to about art.This book elevates drawing, offering viewers an insider look at this often-overlooked medium, bringing it into the modern world.

This is an odd and wonderful combination of practical guidance, projects, interviews with contemporary artists and a lot of beautiful color reproductions. It's really unusual to find a book of practical projects that also has the kind of intellectual heft of "Drawing Projects". It has become my favorite book on drawing over the years, and come back to it and the exercises it recommends any time I'm feeling stuck.

This is a book for artists across the board from beginners to stuck professionals, as it replicates what was termed as 'experimental drawing' at my art school. Not only is it a massive boost to one's own art making capabilities, it overrides procrastination in the sense that all the 'projects' are totally achievable with time frames of approx. 20minutes, sometimes less. The suggestion that the need for high end & expensive materials is not necessary allows for the individual to jump into it here & now. It encourages us to see with fresh eyes, with exciting & contemporary methods without feeling the need to copy or imitate others, giving us what artists really want: The freedom to do what we do.The text is a fantastic read, encompassing & digging deep into our psyches in a real & tangible way & the examples of various artists work here, nothing short of stunning.

This is a good book for what it is. But my bias is that too often, today, those hoping to become artists are urged to learn more about themselves and less about technique and the making of good art. Used to be you learned HOW to draw and paint, and then used the technique to express yourself. Today, it seems the focus is on the "self" first, with too often little regard for anything else. The projects included are good and can help one who is technically accomplished to develop a personal expression. But scribbling one's impressions of the world or throwing together a mishmash of colors without any direction other than self-expression is mere self indulgence and not good art. Learn from this book, yes, but know its value.

One of two great drawing books that introduce a fresh,groundbreaking approach in a field rife with stale "draw likethe great masters" clones.The illustrations are drop-dead gorgeous and right at the edge.If you think of drawing as a ho-hum activity you have to dobefore you can paint, this book will blow your mind.The other must-have drawing book is "Expressive Drawing,A Practical Guide to Freeing the Artist Within."I should add that neither of these books are for people whowant to draw realism or cute illustrations.

This is an excellent book drawing (sorry about the pun) on the expertise of artists and taking the reader through a series of exercises to open the mind & practise drawing intuitively. If you want to learn how to draw hyper realistic pictures this is not for you. But if you want to draw with depth and expression then this book will help you the steps.