The Value of Drawing Instruction in the Visual Arts and Across Curricula Historical and Philosophical Arguments for Drawing in the Digital Age

"The drawing activity (and its cousins: sketching, doodling, painting, design, calligraphy, sculpting) can be traced back in time at least to early cave paintings more than 30,000 years ago, or even to rock art hundreds of thousands of years ago. Drawing is at the birth of writing and the archiving of ideas, knowledge, giving us a more powerful means to extend our cognitive horizons than the mere oral traditions. Seymour Simmons brings back to the centre this fundamental activity necessary to each human's learning and development: each of us experiments and flexes our brain, in infancy, to learn about representing shapes, the world, and imagine and set theatrical scenarios, in large part through drawing. Simmons sets the stage for the next paradigm shift in education and beyond, in the current era dominated by computing and the scientific method: that of unleashing our creativity with the use of our body-mind through the various dimensions offered by drawing."

-- Frederic Fol Leymarie, Professor of Arts Computing, Goldsmiths, University of London, UK

"Seymour Simmons' book is a tour de force, covering the panorama of issues in drawing, the arts, education, philosophy-- indeed, what makes for a full life. The book may well be the best synthesis of Project Zero's contributions to artistic education and artistic knowledge."

-- Howard Gardner, Hobbs Research Professor of Cognition and Education, Harvard Graduate School of Education, USA; Senior Director, Harvard Project Zero, and Ellen Winner, Professor of Psychology Emerita, Boston College, USA; Senior Research Associate, Harvard Project Zero