Making Sense of Crayon Drawings

While I’m on the topic of crayon drawings, my four-and-a-half year old son has really spent a lot of time recently with the Crayolas, primarily rendering superheroes with a similar look. Oblong shaped heads with really long stick legs and arms. They are the sketches of a four-year old in that they bear almost no resemblance to their intended subjects, save for a recent one of Captain America where B did get the shield somewhat right.

What interests me is his evaluation of each drawing. While they all look the same to me, he distinguishes between each, deeming one good, the next bad, even one or two as horrible. Already he has nailed the creative process and how intensely personal it is. I obsess over everything I write and often have a distorted view of how it actually comes off to the outside world. What I think is good isn’t necessarily so, and sometimes the stuff that I think sucks ends up the best received.

My take away is two-fold: one, that all art is little more than a child’s crayon drawing, just one person’s distillation through their own eyes. Secondly, its merit lies not in its creator’s eyes but in the hands of the audience. It’s all in the eye of the beholder (this doesn’t mean the act of creation doesn’t provide some sort of psychological benefit to the creator but that’s a whole other topic).

This may be an oversimplification, as are my son’s drawings. That doesn’t mean they’re not true or accurate. Once I looked at a recent coloring of his and noticed a red shield I knew that he had drawn Captain America. This was Cappy just as was the original artist’s rendering or those who have drawn him over the years. It’s then up to you or me to decide if it resonates, just as it is when it comes to this blog. Does any of this make sense?