In last week’s post I shared some cards I’d made. For one of them, I needed to draw a perfect triangle. Well, this girl has carefully avoided anything remotely resembling math as much as possible, so I had to do some research and then pull out my hardly-used compass. The triangle indeed came out perfect, and it made me wonder: what else can I do with this tool?
So, this week I spent time playing around with a compass, protractor, ruler, and pencil to create the geometrical drawings below:
This was the first design I came up with using the compass, which made me think of a temple.
Even just the compass by itself can create a wide variety of shapes.
I used the compass to draw some circles and was then inspired to watercolor them into worlds.
At this point I started researching some compass designs online, including this mandala inspired one.
This one I adapted from this seven-circle flower design. I plan on painting over this one, so that’s why the lines are so faint.
This was the first drawing I used my protractor on, to create the angles of the rays. I also used a compass to make the circle and a ruler to draw the lines of the rays. I finished it with colored pencils.
I found these last designs on this blog, and fell madly in love with the protractor!
I plan on painting over some of these designs with watercolor, so you’ll probably be seeing those next week. I love the idea of matching the precision of these geometric designs with the organic style of watercolor. I did wonder while doing this project: are these creations art? If anyone following the exact steps I took would create an identical image, is it still art? There’s not really any room for individuality when drawing a straight line upon an exact angle. But the totality, the choices I made on where to draw the lines, what images I saw and pulled out, that seems to return to an individual aesthetic… I’d love to hear anyone’s thoughts on this!
Compulsive Creation 
Replicability of something doesn’t automatically make it not-art. I think it has more to do with ideas. If you’re doing something (replicable or not) but there isn’t an idea behind it, or something you’re bringing to it, then I feel like it is leaning toward not-art. But, sometimes things are just cool and pretty so I feel like that can make them art. Also, I went to an art museum this weekend and there was a literal blank canvas on the wall (there was an idea behind it but still . . .). If that counts, I think cool compass and protractor shapes can also count.
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So for the pieces here where I just followed someone else’s steps and didn’t alter or add upon them, I feel like if it is art it’s a completely impersonal art and I wouldn’t be an “artist” for creating it. It would exist in the same way for anyone who followed those steps and it wasn’t my idea. But I think you’re right in saying that having the original idea, being the first to do something new returns it to the realm of art.
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