Darwing

Theory
Two Ways of Knowing
Betty Edwards has used the terms L-Mode and R-Mode to designate two ways of knowing and seeing - the verbal, analytic mode and the visual, perceptual mode - no matterwhere they are located in the individual brain. You are probably aware of these different characteristics. L-mode is a step-by-step style of thinking, using words, numbers and other symbols. L-modestrings things out in sequences, like words in a sentence. R-mode on the other hand, uses visual information and processes, not step-by-step, but all at once, like recognizing the face of a friend.
|"Youhave two brains: a left and a right. |
|Modern brain scientists now know that your |
|left brain is your verbal and rational |
|brain; it thinks serially and reduces its |
|thoughts tonumbers, letters and words… Your|
|right brain is your nonverbal and intuitive |
|brain; it thinks in patterns, or pictures, |
|composed of ‘whole things,’ and does not |
|comprehendreductions, either numbers, |
|letters, or words." |
|From The Fabric of Mind, by the eminent |
|scientist and neurosurgeon, Richard |
|Bergland. Viking Penguin,Inc., New York |
|1985. pg.1 |


Most activities require both modes, each contributing its special functions, but a few activities require mainly one mode, withoutinterference from the other. Drawing is one of these activities.

Learning to draw, then, turns out not to be "learning to draw." Paradoxically, "learning to draw" means learning to make a mentalshift from L-mode to R-mode. That is what a person trained in drawing does, and that is what you can learn.

Since my mother, Betty Edwards, first published her book in 1979, it has been on the NewYork Times best seller list with more than 2.5 million copies sold. It has been translated into 13 languages and is the world's most widely used drawing instruction book. Her new book "Color - a...