Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain: A Course in Enhancing Creativity and Artistic Confidence by Betty Edwards, and: The Watson Drawing Book by Ernest W. Watson and Aldren A. Watson (review)

Leonardo, Vol. 15, No. 3, pp. 238-255, 1982 Pergamon Press Ltd. Printed in Great Britain The Airbrush Book: Art, History and Technique. Seng-gye Tombs Curtis and Christopher Hunt. Orbis Publishing, London, 1980. 166 pp., illus. €10.00. ISBN: C85613-275-6. Reviewed by Daniel Dallman' It is apparent at first glance that this book has been written, edited and illustrated for clarity. The sequenceis logical in the broad categories and refined, but no less logical, in the subtopics and details. Fully half the book is background information covering the history of the airbrush,a discussion about attitudes toward airbrush art, a gallery of color reproductions and acompletedescription of the mechanical workings of the tool. The second half of the book is more technical and practical, providing a series of lessons and exercises graduated from beginner to experienced artist. Although they have not presented their book as a treatise on modern art, the authors have connected the airbrush to influential movements in early modern art, namely, the suriealists and the 'form follows function' ideas of the Bauhaus. When airbrush illustration became widespread in commercial and industrial fields, it gained a bad name for fine arts use until Pop Art flaunted the image and Photo Realism made use of the technical finesse. The authors' theoretical defensive posture toward the legitimacy of the airbrush for fine art seems overstated, an effort apparently to win followers to the airbrush camp. Far moreeffectiveare the thirty-five pages devoted to a gallery of color examples of art and advertising. That the tool is capable of a wide variety of effects suitable for artists of various aesthetics is clear. The practical sections of the book benefit especially from the clear writing style and organization. In explanations of the various kinds of airbrushes, from the least expensive to professional tools with special applications, the writers have maintained a continuity by basing the descriptions on the Bernoulli principle of air flow. Once understood. the principle is applicable to almost all airbrushes, and one can easily deciphor the technical descriptions and diagrams comparingthe various types of equipment. The other essential elements to airbrush work, media, air pressure systems and masking, are covered with the same precision. With this extensive background information made easily available, the practical exercises that follow are more than adequate to give even a rank beginner complete experience with the airbrush. The four final chapters, covering perhaps half the book, comprise graduated lessons from basic methods of brush handling to complex masking techniques and free-hand methods. It would take a devoted student to follow all the lessons step by step. and the authors acknowledge this with occasional suggestions that some students may not need all the lessons provided. Nevertheless, none of the lessonswere greatly redundant. After basic methods the student will move to exercises in simple techniques. In these lessons the authors chose to label the projects by subject matter rather than visual principles-'stone block' effects,'town scape'. 'figure'-a practice that might limit the imagination of immature artists despite the authors' disclaimer that 'at no stage do wesuggest that the way proposed is the only.. . way'. On the advanced level, the last substantive chapters in the book, the artist will have a good deal of experience which will make the titles, descriptions and organizations less important. The artist will probably not be doing all these exercises but will pick only those relevant to his or her work. The reader with specific goals will find much to overlook, but that is far better than not having enough information. This is a well-wntten book with high quality reproductions and careful and extensive illustrations and diagrams and should be effective for art and graphics students at all ages and levels of experience. It covers an extraordinary range of attitudes, concerns and interests from fine art to hobby painting. I wonder only why it was published so late. about ten years after the need. Had The Airbrush Book been offered in the late 1960s. when airbrush art was on the cutting edge of both commercial art and the then new Photo Realism, it might have been prophetic rather than only a useful. articulate how-to...