Here's an excerpt from chapter 10 of the book I'm writing about the parable of my son Edward. While I'm always wary about sharing a first draft (I wrote this two days ago) that hasn't been fixed by an editor (my wife Fran is my editor), getting feedback from readers is a helpful part of my writing process. Posting on a blog also allows me to include pictures (which I'm pretty sure my future publisher won't go for)!
"Edward loves drawing and will often do a quick sketch at the dining room table while waiting for a meal to be served. His pictures always include familiar, yet slightly different, groups of brightly colored stick-figures. For years I wondered about the identity of the characters in his sketches. Even though I’d studied the works of many artists over the years, I’d never really spent time with his creations.
In his half-page sized pieces, the crowd of characters can be small or large. Sometimes they have names—boy, noy, dad, mom, bin, pen, preen—and other times not. Often, he’ll fill a page with people, leaving some partially drawn and others in the background. In a recent larger work, created at his art program, he included over two hundred characters. It was quite a compelling piece that left me feeling like a mass of humanity was staring back at the me.
After seeing this image on Facebook, an art professor commented, “Edward has an innate understanding of colour harmony. In a very dense image, it is challenging to achieve a sense of compositional balance when there is a high degree of intense chroma. He manages to augment the brilliance of the blue against the red, white, and black along a rhythmic arch that allows the viewer to enter the image with ease.” (cite) I felt so proud reading these words—that Edward’s art would capture a professor’s attention.
This painting, it turns out, was on display for weeks at Calgary’s prestigious downtown Central Library and was purchased by a library patron. Because Edward never tells us anything, we had no idea. I remember feeling both elated and disappointed at the news—Edward sold a painting to someone in the general public, and I never got to visit the library with him and tell him how proud I was before it sold.
This is how it often works with Edward’s life and art—he makes beautiful things and knows what he’s doing, even as I’m unaware of his creations and can’t understand what he’s trying to communicate.
After that library painting sold, I committed to saving Edward’s dining room table sketches—with the hope of better understanding what he’s trying to say through his pieces. Once I had accumulated a small stack of drawings, I sat down to examine them and began to notice a few things.
Two sketches were quite similar to each other—almost identical. Both had roughly the same number of characters, drawn in the same place with the same colors, and with partially-decipherable, similar-looking names above the main character’s heads. As I looked at the misspelled names, side-by-side, they formed a composite that clearly said, Cinderella. How could I have missed seeing this? And if she’s Cinderella then surely the character beside her, labelled ‘pen’, must be the prince. And that must mean that the dozen or so, smaller, faceless, creatures are the mice who helped Cinderella.
Figuring this sketch out, I wondered if all of Edward’s creations were scenes from his favorite movies and books.
The next drawing certainly was. I could clearly see that the horizontal character was Snow White, wearing a blue-topped, yellow-bottomed dress with black hair. Once I recognized her, it was hard not to notice the seven short characters that now seemed to have beards. The group of four-legged purple creatures to the right must be forest animals. As recognized all the characters in the scene, I noticed how spot-on their colors were. Clearly there is a color-code when it comes to understanding Edward’s creations. The next drawing had one smaller character with red shorts and shoulder straps, a yellow shirt, and black hair—clearly Pinocchio. I was on a roll.
I started to see the detailed scope of his many Narnia-based drawings much more clearly—Peter, Edmund, Susan and Lucy, centaurs everywhere, and a wardrobe door. Two other sketches centered around a red-clad character with green-face—obviously the Grinch surrounded by Whos.
One of his pieces was a composite of characters from different stories. Because I was getting up to speed with what Edward does, I quickly identified who he was drawing—Susan, Pinocchio, Woody, and few others. As I went through the rest of sketches I kept seeing more. This is what all of Edward drawings are all about—he’s recreating his favourite stories.
What I love about each of his pieces is that he always draws himself into the scene. In his mind, he’s part of the story. Rembrandt did the same with several of his paintings—he was a disciple in the boat caught in the storm on the Sea of Galilee, a soldier doing his job at the crucifixion, and a prodigal son partying his life away in a brothel. Rembrandt saw himself as part of the Jesus story—he yearned to trust Christ in the storm, own his culpability in the Jesus’ death, and confess his prone-to-wander heart. Like Rembrandt, Edward sees himself as part of the action.
Like any artist, he engages deeply and needs to express what he’s experienced. Perhaps Edward lives into imaginary worlds in different ways than the rest of us do. Maybe that’s why he loves watching his movies over and over again. I wonder if the child in Edward doesn’t separate fiction from reality like I do. Perhaps he’s a natural at entering into other worlds—Whoville, Narnia, and the Kingdom of God—and living into them fully. No wonder he revisits and recreates those worlds so often.
Several years ago, I did a pen and ink reproduction of a Rembrandt etching titled, The Supper at Emmaus. While I had preached on this bible story many times before, never had I drawn it. As I sketched the astonished faces and hands of Jesus’ two disciples it felt as though I was sharing in their recognition of Christ’s presence. When I drew the clasped hands of the woman on Jesus’ right, I felt gratitude for seeing Jesus for who he was. When I penned the raised hand of the man on Jesus’ left, I shared his astonishment and trepidation. When I drew Jesus’ hands—breaking the bread—I noticed how he was offering a piece of his communal gift to each of his two disciples. At that point I swear I could smell the bread.
There is something about these sketched elements coming into being by your own hand that deepens your experience of the story. It was like I’d become a co-creator of the scene with Rembrandt. I was bringing a story to life with my pen. I bestowed identity and emotion through shape, weight, and shadow—even as Edward does the same with his simple lines and precise colors. Both of us were recreating the beautiful works of another; affirming their impact on us and honoring their beauty by artistically participating in their creation. We weren’t just copying images; we were imaging their creators. I’m pretty sure that the inspiration that Edward and I experience in these co-creating moments comes from a source far beyond Rembrandt van Rijn and Walt Disney.
Years ago, I remember entering a hotel room, starting to unpack, and noticing that Edward wasn’t in the room. The moment I asked his mom where he was, he tumbled out of a big wardrobe in the center of the room. Of course, we all laughed at his physical humor. But now, pondering his creative imagination, I wonder where he went when he was in there.
Does bringing a marker to a page take Edward to places I can’t perceive? Does every wardrobe spark an adventure for him? I’m beginning to wonder if Edward’s world is more enchanted than I know."
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