For most of my life, I identified as a “frustrated artist”. I’ve always been able to mentally picture the image I want to draw or paint. I’ve even been able to visualise the process of creating the image, in detail. Where it always broke down, was when I put pencil, pen, or brush to whatever medium I’d chosen to hold my masterpiece. It just didn’t work.
I’ve long lost count of the number of artists and other well-meaning people who told me that I just needed to practise more … and/or better. I’ve long lost count of the number of hours I spent practising, and assiduously completing courses, tutorials, and methods “guaranteed” to make me into the artist I want to be. I’ve drawn on both sides of my brain, with both hands, and, as a kid, even tried holding a pencil or brush with my toes or mouth. Sure, I improved a little over the decades, but didn’t produce any work I was happy with, or felt comfortable sharing.
Photography became my sole visual arts outlet and expression. For most of my life, as passionate as I was about it, I saw photography as an artistic consolation prize. Stupid of me, I know, but I’m being real here.
Then, about eight years ago, we sent our (then-mid-teens) daughter for in-depth aptitude testing. To cut a long story very short, the tester/therapist picked up that she had a relatively rare, and minimally-studied learning disorder, known as dysgraphia. As the therapist told us about the symptoms & challenges of dysgraphia, I was overcome with memory, discovery, and emotion. Eventually, I managed to shake off my daze of enlightenment just enough to blurt out, “You’re describing my life!”.
In short, dysgraphia is a breakdown between what one knows, and one’s ability to reproduce that mental data via (mainly) writing, drawing, painting, etc., although in some cases (apparently fairly rare) it can also have a negative impact on verbal response. In computer terms … data retrieval, input, storage, and indexing are all working fine. But, the output … data shown on the printer and/or monitor (sometimes the loud-speaker), is corrupted. Output can be anything from lost, to illegible, and/or exceedingly slow.
For instance, I had always battled to reproduce memorised content. I was the pastor’s son who “couldn’t memorise” bible verses. I was the singer-guitarist, and lover of songs and poetry, who couldn’t remember the words and chords. I was the kid (and adult) who loved to write, but struggled, epically, to get anything on paper. What I did manage to write through these struggles, was often rambling … not to mention, stylistically and grammatically horrendous. Learning about dysgraphia explained why my writing became almost magically easier (and much better) when I began typing, rather than handwriting. Apparently, the information output routes for typing are different to those used for writing, drawing, or painting.
Dysgraphia also explained my persistent difficulty with drawing and painting. It is hard to believe – even for me – the difference made by simply being able to put a name to the problem. Rather than just being a bad artist, I had a specific, defined problem that I could work on.
Over the years, I’ve needed to create many internal tricks, structures, games, and mental images to help me complete otherwise simple writing, arithmetic, and other tasks, like tests & exams. So, it turns out that Dysgraphia definitely made it necessary for me to think outside of the box. Dysgraphia taught me to find creative ways over, around, and through challenges. I’ve also had to work incredibly hard at simple, structural things like multiplication tables, and spelling & grammar. Dysgraphia forced me to pay extra attention to the structures that make things work well. Of course, for most of my life, I was largely unaware that others didn’t do things the way I did. I just thought that they were better, and that I sucked. Over the past eight years, I’ve applied some of that unusual thinking, along with all I could find out about dysgraphia, to working on my visual arts abilities.
All of this has helped me to my analogue visual art far more quickly than I have at any other time in my life. I still have a very long way to go, but now I’m finding much more enjoyment in the process, along with new-found emotional and creative freedom. I’ve found confidence to work on visual arts in ways I wouldn’t have before. In recent years, alongside drawing and painting, I’ve made successful inroads into digital, vector art and design, and constantly experiment with various forms of digital art.
Don’t get me wrong, non-photographic visual arts are still my area of greatest creative challenge and growth. I spent decades believing that I couldn’t draw or paint, and that’s really hard to overcome. That said, I believe I’ve made more progress during the past eight years, than in the previous fifty-one. I’ll let you all judge for yourselves.
