Do You Draw What You See?

If I asked you to draw a house what would it look like? What about a person? Would you draw a stick figure? We often learn to draw things in a certain way, even if that’s not what the object looks like in real life. This collection of things we know simply by being taught them is called schemata. Take a look at this house for instance (Figure One). We know it is a house, even if it looks nothing like the houses we see in everyday life.

Schemata are woven intricately into all of our lives. Especially for those of us who play an everyday role in the art world. Even when I look at my own pieces I can now see how schemata has played a role in my art.

Consider this piece that I created for a collage project for 2D (Figure Two). This entire piece is built with schemata. You can tell that those are hands, but they are not naturalistic. Nor are the wasps. The piece depends heavily on line-work, layering, and visual texture. They are designed completely with schemata. As these artistic tools are something that I was taught in school and through other art. Not something I learned simply by looking at reality.