Lawrence Zeegen - I draw, you draw, we draw, they draw
On Monday I went to St Peter’s House Library in Brighton to attend a talk by Lawrence Zeegen. He is the head of the Graphic Design & Illustration undergraduate and post graduate courses at the University of Brighton and is also a successful illustrator with regular illustrations appearing in the Guardian newspaper on the comment and debate page.
His talk was entitled “I draw, you draw, we draw, they draw.” and was about his influences as an artist as well as a workshop he had run at the Guardian HQ to encourage children to draw.
He mentioned quite a few artists during the talk and also provided some interesting quotes (some of which I have included at the bottom of this post). One of the first people who he spoke about was Keith Haring who apparently used to run around the subway drawing using chalk on the walls where expired adverts had been covered up with large black sheets:
He spoke about trying to get back to the way in which we all used to draw in childhood, which was so pure and honest and how as we get older, often through bad teaching we lose the spirit and joy we used to create drawings with.
The technique he seemed to use when creating a lot of his drawing was using other peoples (often amateurish) drawings, tracing these and creating something new using them:
Lawrence also spoke about Edwyn Collins the singer… (not sure if anyone else remember this song-I think I was about 13 when it came out!):
Edwyn suffered a brain haemorrhage a few years ago and to aid his recovery started drawing from a book of birds with his left hand. Apparently he was on his way to becoming a wildlife artist when he took a divergent path into music. An exhibition of all of his drawings is on at the moment at the Smithfield Gallery in London.
Lawrence believes that the goal of any illustration should be to communicate an idea as simply as possible and he strives to create images which contain the purity of childhood drawing. He believes that when we create a drawing we should not attempt to communicate everything but instead should simply encourage the viewer to use their imagination.
My illustration tutor, Sue Tribe, also spoke about drawing and honesty in last Saturdays’ Illustration class saying that we should repeat this to ourselves like a mantra whenever we are drawing “I want to make my drawings unpretentious and honest.”
Here are some interesting quotes from Lawrence Zeegens talk:
“Drawing is still basically the same as it has been since prehistoric times. It brings together man and the world. It lives through the magic.”
“I prefer drawing to talking. Drawing is faster, and leaves less room for lies”
“Drawing is the honesty of the art. There is no possibility of cheating. It is either good or bad.”
“I am among the few who continue to draw after childhood has ended, continuing and perfecting childhood drawing — without the traditional interruption of academic training.”
AND
“I am not materialistic, I believe in presents from the heart like a drawing that a child does.”















