I have a delightful book called Savvy Sayin’s – Lean & Meaty One-liners. It’s a collection of old time western lore and art. It’s full of wise and pithy sayings, and because of the clever “western” idiom, packs a special wallop. Funny how a lot of philosophy can be compacted into a simple colloquialism. Well, I thought, why can’t something like this be directed to drawing? You know me — I’ll try (almost) anything.
Here are a few excerpts from the book. Frederic Remington and Charles M. Russell illustrated the book.
If you follow a new track,
there ain’t no way of knowin’
If the man that made it
knew where he was goin.’
In between the illustrated one-liners are gems like these’ ns/
Broke is what happens when you let your yearnin’s get ahead of your earnin’s.
Borrowin’ is like scratchin’. It only feels good for a little while.
A string around the finger helps you remember. A rope around your neck helps you forget.
Lightning does the work; thunder takes the credit.
Drownin’ your sorrows only irrigates ‘em.
The good thing about talkin’ to your horse is he don’t talk back.
And here’s my version. Let’s call it Walt’s Witty Wisdom, the Western Way, with illustrations by a local artist. (Or is that loco?)
If yer eyes is stuck on the model, yer mind is bein’ left out.
It may take two hundert words to convince someone thet yer honest, but it only takes five lines in a drawin’ ta prove you ain’t.
In drawin’, yer eyes and yer mind is pardners — yer eyes sees it first but yer mind has to correct what they seen.
When you decide yer through with a drawin’ — you’ve prob’ly gone too fer.
Life sometimes takes a heap of explainin’, but a drawin’ has gotta stand all by its self.
A model kin only go so fer — a drawin’ has no limits.
It ain’t th’ number of lines in a drawin’ — it’s how they bin corralled.
Any details thet don’t help the gesture ‘ll never be missed.
When drawin’s takes tha place of talk — they gotta say jest as much.
Lines used by artists is like a cowhands skill — if he cain’t break a hoss, there ain’t gonna be nothin’ ta ride.
Lines is like members of a basketball team — if they don’t work together, they ain’t gonna be much slam-dunkin’.
Some well-chosen lines in a drawin’ is like choosin’ the right trail on the range.
They say a picture is worth a thousan’ words, so with a little rationin’, you could git a lot of drawin’s out o’ that many.
Drawin’ is like buildin’ a corral — ya gotta layout the overall shape first.
Like a good cup of strong coffee will git a cowboy goin’ in the mornin’, some good strong angles will get a drawin’ off to a good start.
It takes a human a heap of years ta develop a set of gestures — artist’s has gotta do it in a couple of minutes.
A model may strain to keep the pose, but a good drawin’ looks fresh forever.
A good drawin’ doesn’t need dialogue ta say what it’s got ta.
Many a poker hand is won by luck, but a good drawin’ is got by skill.
Actually these cartoons were drawn in my motel room in Burbank in the evening. They were my way of relaxing after a day at the studio. Usually a night’s batch would focus on one or two subjects. These happened to be on drawing. An average batch averaged around a dozen. Here are a few more.
