Earlier This Week In My Drawing L Class, We Had To Draw Six Hands In Various Poses For The Homework.

Earlier this week in my Drawing l class, we had to draw six hands in various poses for the homework. The day of critique, we all put up our drawings, and the professor began the crit, particularly noting whether or not the anatomy of each person's drawing seemed correct.

He gave the usual spiel about how the fingers are equal to the length of the palm, so on and so forth. But he stopped mid explanation to caution against taking his word too seriously, because apparently years ago, someone came to class with a drawing of hands which had very very stubby thumbs. As he phrased it, he "laid into" the student in criticism of the stubbiness and incorrectness of the thumbs, just absolutely eviscerating her drawing.

When he was finished speaking the student held up her hand. She had a stubby thumb. Probably a minor birth defect or lost in an accident of some kind.

The poor professor explained that he was obviously horrified with himself, and now he clarifies with every class he teaches that anatomy guidelines are helpful, general suggestions, not rules.

I want to tell a story to the artists and would-be artists out there.

When I was 19, I made a large oil painting of the nerd I would eventually marry. I poured all my attention and care into this painting. It's the only art I have from back then that still holds up as a work I'm proud of today.

I entered it into a judged show at the local art center. It got an honorable mention. I went to see the show with my beloved model. One of the judges came up to talk to me, and highlighted that all the judges really liked the painting. It would have placed, except, you see, the feet were incorrect. They were too wide and short, and if I just studied a bit more anatomy-

I called over my future wife, and asked her to take off her shoe. Being already very used to humoring me, she did. The judge looked at her very short, very wide little foot. Exactly as I'd lovingly rendered it. I would never edit her appearance in any way.

The judge looked me in the eye, and to his credit, he really looked like he meant it when he said "Oh I'm so sorry."

Anyways the moral of the story is that all of those anatomy books that teach you proportions are either showing you averages, or a very specific idea of an idealized body. Actual bodies are much more varied than that.

So don't forget to draw from observation, and remember that humans aren't mass produced mannequins. Delight in our variation. Because it's supposed to be there.