In the beginning there were walls that looked innocent and clean. Man (and women I presume) decided to use these blank canvasses to express emotions and tell stories. Bingo, we have wonderful ancient graffiti sharing their daily adventures, from killing animals, chatting with aliens, hands, animals and many more amazing drawings.
Just to be clear, this is not an archeology lecture or some other elaborate tale to explain how cave drawings appeared and what they might mean. No, this is to illustrate that even in today’s technology driven society, cave drawings still haunts us – especially us parents as our kids evolve.
As you know, we have three beautiful kids; two girls and one boy. Each child have unique skills and various levels of energy, and we fully support our kids in growing their skills further – unless it’s their ability to watch endless TV shows on Netflix about annoying ponies or playing ‘Temple Run‘.
But one of the kids is much more creative than her siblings. And, she has hell of a lot more energy than the others which is most likely because she’s the youngest and wants to keep up with the older siblings.
The older siblings also expressed their artistic skills, but only on the paper they we using. Yes, it did happen that they drew on the table, but nothing remotely as severe as the tiny artist.
She has taken drawing to a new level, which includes selecting new canvasses and expressing her emotions on walls and furniture. Nothing beats coming home seeing a new creation on the family sofa, bathroom wall, dinning table or stairs. Most times these can be “easily” removed with water and soap, but since she has moved from water colours to permanent markers, it has become increasingly impossible.
She has also taken her skills on the road, and we have now some drawings in the car and on her clothes.
When I catch her in the act, and demands she stops, I get the 1000 yards stare and being told that she hasn’t done anything. It was her brother! That is despite her standing with the marker, on the wall, drawing a long line. Even the CSI team would support my accusations!
Although it is rather frustrating, it can be covered up with wall paint, which we will do once she stops using the walls as her canvas – if she stops!
From an artistic perspective, you have to applaud her skills and if you study her drawings in more detail, you can see how she is enhancing her abilities. The earlier stages are simple lines, then X’s, faces and people. I would perhaps go as far to state that some of her art works are more impressive than some of the new modern artists who pains a black dot on a white canvas … or nothing on the white canvas!
Michelangelo, Raphael, Da Vinci, and other artists of the ancient World would most likely look at my daughters paintings and discover her hidden talents. In the eyes of (in my opinion) VERY suprematism artists, our kids are completely wasting their time actually learning the craft of painting or splash paint about like the great Pollock, or painting three stripes endlessly like Rothko.
Long story short, as a parent and house owner, I dread seeing my house covered in cave drawings, but I cannot spend too much time getting upset about it. It’s only a few lines and we’ll be pairing the walls soon. Anyway, judge for yourself 🙂
How are your kids expressing themselves?