Tuesday, February 20, 2007

Kid Drawings

Via "Clicked" (a really neat column on MSNBC where the author tracks all of the sites he visits every day and then compiles them into a narrative list) I found this really neat site where professional artists take drawings from kids and work them up into formal illustrations. The results are pretty startling. The images are first-rate and would do any portfolio proud. Here's just one example:



You can see the full gallery at DrawerGeeks.com. Our culture tends to dismiss children's art out of hand, but I think this site shows that their creativity is the equal (at least!) of any adults. All they lack are the technical tools to bring those visions into a form the adult world can respect. That's one of the goals I had with HeroMachine, to allow kids to borrow the skills of a professional illustrator in bringing their own creative visions to life.

P.S. If anyone from DrawerGeek reads this, please send me an invite! I'd love to be able to participate. Don't make me beg ... OK, fine. I'm begging. Pleeeeeaaaasssseeee!

3 comments:

Rob Rogers said...

Dude, that's an awesome site.

And my son Alex loves designing pictures using HeroMachine.

Anonymous said...

Boy, what a discussion- this entails the distillation of what defines true art. If art is a physical expession of our inner being, and children are by their nature closer to their "true being", then true art of children may be a higher form than anyone can imagine. We adults just don't (or cannot) "get it". Personally, my monsters and fears were far more real and visual when I was a kid than they are now. How many nights did I hide under my covers so that the "hand of death" that I saw in a movie wouldn't choke me??!! Somehow it made sense that the all powerful hand could not penetrate the mighty K-Mart sheets! Yes, I think I could have drawn that horrible hand that slowly slowly crawled towards me to inflict pain upon me! At the age of 50 I only wish I could imagine the demons that gnaw at my belly and cause me to churn in bed at 3 AM. If I could name them perhaps they would be conquered. Of course, it's not ME I talk about, just, you know, other less mature people!
No way I sign this!!!!!!!

Denise said...

Great idea. Some of those kids, however, have quite macabre imaginations! What happened to rainbows and flowers?!