Draw the People You Love
A gist-of-mom series of snapshots of ordinary moments from a recent visit
Today’s letter is a nudge to take the photos, draw the people you care about, and capture the edges. Slow down, look closely, and be present.
“‘I don’t think a camera will bring my mother back.’ ‘What I’m suggesting,’ Caroline said softly, ‘is that the lens can function as a shield between you and the world, when the world’s just a little too much to bear. If you can’t stand to look at the world directly, maybe it’s possible to look at it through the viewfinder.’” — Emily St. John Mandel, The Glass Hotel
I wrote my Sunday letter and then removed it. It is hard this week, with the fires raging in Southern California, to write about the quotidian without feeling superficial. The footage has been heartbreaking and terrifying. I know some of you are in the area or have loved ones there. It seems wrong to write about ordinary things, to express anxiety, or to whine about anything. I want to acknowledge that before diving in and talking about a series that I hope doesn’t come off as trite.
My mom left this morning.
Amy
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A Series of Mom
One of the things that I mentioned in December that I would potentially do again, in addition to tracking morning light, was a few digital drawings of my mom while she was here over the holidays. Last year was the first time I tried this, a few digital captures of Mom alongside a whimsical series of nutcrackers.
It was an impromptu project last year, but I enjoyed it. Partly, it’s sometimes a juggle to fit all of my projects in during these weeks, and partly this is a project that is easy to do while sitting and watching TV at night or while sitting at the beach, at the lake, in the library, or anywhere else.
More importantly, it is an exercise in looking, an exercise in being present.
I would like to say that I managed one a day, but I didn’t. It sounds easy in concept, but it just didn’t happen. The digital drawings take longer than it might seem.
The first drawing I did this time was of her sitting across from me in a chair watching TV. We were watching Love, Actually. This was the first year she somewhat enjoyed it.
She was in one of the two chairs, chairs that always taunt me a bit because when I look at them, I also see the chairs that were there before, honey-gold chairs with a warm red and green poppy print. She was in one of the gray chairs, a soft red and white striped blanket wrapped around her. It was almost always cold in the house. A large green quilt is draped over the back of the chair, a quilt I made as a collaborative “year project” several years ago. The blanket and quilt became part of the backdrop for many of the photos I snapped.
The facing chairs were our spots for much of this visit, me working through the day and us watching TV, knitting, playing games, or talking through the night.
As with anything else, while the contours may seem almost the same, things are always just a little bit different from photo to photo. We look different every time we shift. Clothes change. Body positions change. Expressions change.
I got hooked on snapping these candid in-the-moment photos while we were just sitting and being ourselves, doing regular things, and spending time together. I snapped photos of her watching TV and knitting and playing cribbage and talking and playing games on her phone and working in her planner on her iPad and so on. I also snapped photos when we were out and about.
I took lots of photos.
Then I drew some of them on the iPad.
Overall, they are exceptionally wonky.
Those Don’t Look Like Me
She knew I was working on these, but I didn’t let her look at them up close until right before she left. It’s a vulnerable project (for both of us) because they (maybe) don’t really look like her. If I did them on paper, would they look more like her? I don’t know. Maybe. I do typically draw her in my illustrated journal a few times a year. I drew her during one of the December weeks (in a Santa hat). But digital is different.
Digital is sometimes like drawing with a cotton swab and hoping to get some detail. It is also, for me, an exercise in letting go of detail and simplifying to minimal, thick, bold contours. This isn’t everyone’s approach, but it is mine.1
Objectively, the drawings (maybe) do not look like my mom. Her hair color varies picture to picture. Her skin tone varies picture to picture. The chair is always the same and yet looks different every time. There is no standard palette.
Here are some of the digital drawings that I finished by today. I have others started and photos for a number of others in place and ready to draw, but these are the ones that are done.
Do What You Enjoy
At some point in the process, I really got attached to these digital snapshots. They matter to me.
We always hear that we imbue any drawing with part of ourselves, that something of us, of our perspective, of our mood, and of the way we see the world is in our art. Sometimes when I look at the ways in which these photos are slightly off, I wonder about the process our brains go through when we draw, perceiving what we are looking at and channeling that information to and through our hands.
I wonder what of me and my perspective right now is coming through in these drawings as I really focus closely on the outline of my mom, not the fine lines, not the close-up portrait lines full of hatching, form, and shadow, just the contours.
These strike me as gist of Mom drawings, a broad stroke that is a bit fuzzy in places but captures a moment. This haziness, this simplification, is similar to memory and yet also helps reinforce memory. This was a single moment. This was another.
Taken together, they tell a story.
This series was more involved than the few digital drawings I did last December. On paper, I’ve drawn the kids many times over the last several years, and other family members on special occasions. But I’ve never done quite such a deep dive on a single person (other than my own ongoing selfie series).
It will come as no surprise to many of you how much I wish I had done something like this over the last few years in my house. I don’t even have the photos now to be able to make that possible. I wish I did. I wish I had been taking photos and drawing them. I wish I had done that.
We don’t always know or understand in the middle of things what we need or will need or want or will want, what will matter. Sometimes, we get caught in respecting someone else’s story so much that we lose our own.
I encourage you to document the people that you care about.
If that means just taking a bunch of photos when you’re with someone so that you have them later, then do it. If it means drawing a portrait once a week or once a month of your kids or your partner or your parents or your family members or your friends, do it.
I do a weekly selfie project that I consider a simple but grounding part of my illustrated journal. But, looking beyond, I think that there is something really compelling in the process of drawing people we care about.
I’m glad that I went ahead and did these drawings of Mom even though I feel I should justify them, downplay them, and shrug a bit when I show them. I look at them fairly critically, but I also look at them with love.
Intuitively and instinctively, I feel certain that this was an important thing to do, an important way to spend creative time and evening hours. It isn’t about how perfectly drawn these are. Yes, they are a wonderful learning opportunity, and there are multiple things I could talk about about this process.
But, ultimately, the bottom line is that if you have the chance to draw the people you love, you should.
People so often say they don’t know what to draw on their illustrated journal pages. I offer dozens of answers to that, depending on the day and the person, but they all boil down to the same thing: Draw your life. Draw your space. Draw the things that matter to you. Draw yourself. Draw your pets. Draw the people you love.
Drawing things brings us closer to them, closer to knowing and understanding, closer to appreciating, and closer to remembering. Drawing brings us closer to gratitude.
Photos from the Week
Blooper
One night I pulled up a photo to draw, and I didn’t realize I had already drawn it before until I was almost finished. It kept feeling somehow familiar, but I didn’t really remember. It’s an interesting reminder that even if we draw the same thing multiple times, it may come out different, even very different, each time.
Weekly Bits and Pieces
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Made It?
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Last week, I shared a mix of writing, digital art, photos, and my illustrated journal. the assemblage seemed to land me in a void, which was confusing. I so appreciate those of you who read, those who comment, those who draw with me, and those who are helping support this space with paid subscriptions.
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Yes, I can use a much smaller tip, but then the entire process of drawing on iPad doesn’t work as well for me.
“Overall, they are exceptionally wonky.” This. This right here is what makes them great, at least to me. I absolutely love the wonk, as I’m sure you know. It’s such a welcoming thing to see artists who are willing to allow that to happen and are willing to put it out into the world, to show that everything doesn’t need to be polished and perfect.
Thank you for that ❤️
Thank you for this reminder.
Yours is one of the VERY few Substacks that I actually read every week, although then I have to try not to go down rabbit holes of things and older letters you link to!