Maybe Picasso was onto something

Picasso once said, "It took me four years to paint like Raphael, but a lifetime to paint like a child."  I didn't understand that the first time I read it, when I was in my teens. By that time I'd long since dropped Art as a school subject, but I was still drawing in my own time, and frankly I was doing my level best to get away from drawing like a child. But now, well, I think I understand what he was getting at.

What brought this home to me was that yesterday I was asked to pick my granddaughter Amelia up from school and look after her for a few hours until my daughter finishes work. When I pick her up she usually plays with her slightly older cousin Ollie - he and his mum, my oldest daughter, live in our house. But Ollie was picked up from school by his Dad and went back to his house yesterday so Amelia was on her own. I asked whether she wanted to play some board games, go over the park or make some pictures. She opted for picture making, much to my delight. We found a picture of a kitten in a book, and started to make our pictures of it. We used a set of coloured pencils I've had for some time now. Here's the pictures:-

Amelia's kitten picture and mine side by side

My picture - nice but at the end of the day it's just a cat

Mimi's picture - not just a cat - but sunshine and showers, a rainbow and hearts. All in all a cornucopia of happiness. 

I'll be honest, I'm a bit blown away by Amelia's picture. Yes, mine is more accurate in terms of reproducing the photo in the book. We began and I took Mimi through steps to draw the eyes and the nose. But then I could see that she was just bursting to get on with it, so I let her go her own way and stopped directing her what marks to make. What burst from the pencils was this.

What I can't do for you is reproduce the commentary she was giving me while she was making it. I wish I'd somehow recorded it. But there is a child's logic to every mark that she made in this picture. It would never have occurred to me to juxtapose sun and rain above the cat, but the way Mimi explained it made perfect sense. Everything in the picture she thought out as she went along, and while I might not be able to explain it now, I just love it. I look at my picture, and I feel a bit of satisfaction since I've used an unfamiliar medium quite well. But I look at Mimi's picture and I feel joy and freedom. 

And isn't that what Art is supposed to be about for us amateurs?