Drawing

I soon will teach a course where I will ask the students to construct a general definition of drawing and a personal definition of drawing both of which to be refined throughout the semester. I know full well that in this contemporary context this is a near impossible task. But I also know that the chasing after the mark is more important and more likely to be productive than ever hitting it.

Drawing is elusive, perplexing, slippery, built on technique, not built on technique, what you think it is, what you'd never think it is, our first language, the language most readily ignored in our educations, magical and mundane. In defining drawing do we start at its practicality, its heart, its soul, its poetry, its possibility, its visuality, its essentiality, its vitality, its nakedness?

I've tried my own definitions often and seem to both move ahead and fall short at every try. Maybe I'll share some them in a later post. What's your experience?