By Paula Briggs

At the AccessArt Art Club for ages 7, 8 and 9, we followed on from our exploration of perspective through drawing Lego with a “Believing What You See” Challenge! When we draw, we often assume we know what something looks like. When we really look at an object it’s often hard to really believe in the shapes we see (should that leg really be so high up and small??), and our mind often tries to trick us into drawing what we think it SHOULD look like.

In this exercise, children used their knowledge of negative and positive spaces, and the grid method, to create scaled up drawings of dog silhouettes. The shapes in the silhouettes are often “strange” or “unlikely” and yet the end result to the eye says “dog”. Through this exercises children learnt to trust what they see, and to appreciate the relationship of “part” to “whole”.

Using the grid method, combined with seeing negative and positive shapes, to scale up a drawing

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