Art Unboxed What I’ve Learned

I started drawing because I wanted to draw. I started painting, wanting to paint. Neither of these is profound, but what I’ve learned along the way has profoundly affected me. Because what started out for me as a hobby, has taught me so much.

I don’t just mean some philosophical concept, it’s taught me dexterity. On the other side, it’s added to my knowledge, understanding, and appreciation. One way I’ve touched on before, was in appreciation of music.

When you’re tone deaf, music is like a foreign language you can’t wrap your head around. You can appreciate the concepts of notes, but you can’t really grasp it. At least I couldn’t, but I can through painting.

It’s taught me about a side of history I would have normally never learned about. Beyond all this, it’s taught me things which I never expected to learn. Stories of courage like Churchill whose eyes near the end were so dim he couldn’t see much, but he still painted. It strikes me that Churchill painted first, and Eisenhower took it up.

We know they discussed the act of painting. We also know that a painter named Thomas E. Stephen’s directly inspired Eisenhower to pursue the past time. Both men saw value in it, and because they saw value in it, they left something behind that is different than most Prime Ministers and Presidents, not all, but most.

In a very real way, we saw not only what they saw, but how they saw it. How many politicians have sought to position people to see things the way they saw them? Succeed or fail, they didn’t do it the way these two men did.

Seeing things from someone else’s perspective is so important. Communicating through pictures is something I didn’t think about when I started drawing, but it’s a wonderful blessing in my life. As a Christian, I believe that God drops desires, talents, pursuits, and curiosity in our spirit to explore.

When we discover them, if we’re careful, we see God’s hand in this path, and are grateful. Everything He has blessed me with, I am thankful. Because, it’s taught me more than how to hold a brush, it’s showed me Who painted us with His brush.