Drawing from Perception: Rewiring the Brain for Observational Art

Drawing from Perception demystifies the art of drawing from observation and integrates new approaches to understanding the ways in which we perceive the world around us.

As we navigate our daily lives, the mind works relentlessly in the background, actively constructing models of our experience in order to anticipate what will happen next. Unlike a camera taking a photograph, we see the world as an assembly of things that we have previously learned triggered by momentary visual stimuli.

Using the strategies in this book, we will learn how to shift the balance toward visual accuracy while still maintaining a clear understanding of how the brain creates models of what we see. Rather than simply looking at the subject, we will learn to truly see it using both observation and what we know about the ways that humans perceive the world. That delicate balance is at the heart of drawing from perception.