Think about it for a moment. Your average ‘ box fresh’ pencil is over 95% writing material and less than 5% rubbing out / erasing material. If that’s not a instrument of optimism I don’t know what is.

Pencils; optimists on your behalf. I was introduced to the idea of a pencil being a instrument of optimism by the Spanish Photographer Chema Madoz. His work photographing everyday objects from different perspectives makes me both think and smile.

In this video Chema talks about how he was dissatisfied with his (pencil) sketches as he doesn’t have a “hand” for drawing. Then later he makes the statement that “pencils are an optimistic object…to me a few successes and many errors is more realistic.” (9.50 – 10.10 mins.)

Chema has created one picture of a pencil comprising around 90% eraser and 10% pencil. This is possibly a more accurate reflection of the reality for lots of us. More time spent rubbing out the mistakes than actually creating something permanent on paper.

Is rubbing things out tolerated failure? I’ve been thinking a lot about this. The idea of learning through trial and error is widely understood and accepted.

Is then the pencil, eraser and a blank piece of paper the ‘starter pack’ for learning from tolerated failure?

An activity where you can ‘learn’ by sketching, erasing and refining things. Learning from small tolerated / acceptable failures.

Leaning from failure is something that can help us get better at a whole host of things, if we let it…

I’ve written about it here in ‘that which does not kill us makes us stronger. All about the idea of beneficial accidents and survivable failure.

The idea that ‘low cost’, tolerated failure embeds learning better that success is also something I’ve written about. The opportunity to learn how to try, fail and learn is something I think we should all seek out. Maybe just by picking up a pencil and paper and starting to draw? But do it while you can still get hold of a pencil…

Digital ‘failure free’, perfect art. Someone I know is big into digital art. They spend a lot of time sketching on a tablet, creating all sorts of good looking art.

I’m impressed when I see it, but left with a nagging doubt. Where is all the rubbing out? Would it be as good if they had used pencil and paper? Have they really learnt to sketch? Are they a ‘proper’ artist?

Maybe I’m worrying about nothing. Research with artists using both analogue (pencils and paper) and digital tools to create drawings found no difference in the accuracy of what they produced. ‘To erase or not to erase…’ was published in the Journal of Art, Design and Communication in Higher Education in 2020.

It does strike me though that the research was carried out with people with ‘some’ level of drawing skill. It also makes the point that pencil and eraser marks ‘leave a trace’ that a teacher can use to provide coaching and feedback. While the digital option removes everything.

Maybe digital is fine for people with an existing level of skill, but where does it leave ‘ham fisted’ scribblers like me? Will I miss out on valuable feedback and learning from small tolerated, low cost failures?

Is AI going to make it worse? If Artificial Intelligence does half of what the hype suggests we could end up with a world of perfect art; I really don’t fancy that.

I quite like imperfections and the idea that learning from failure happened along the way. And just to prove that…

The original sketch I drew for this post was on scrap paper, with limited drawing materials in less than perfect conditions. It was rough, but I liked it. ‘Good enough is better than perfect…’ Oh yeah, JDI!

Then I spotted the massive spelling mistake. Optomism spelt wrong. I actually went to the length of looking up ‘optomism’. Surely the Americans spell it like that, I’ll get away with it. Nope!

The Urban Dictionary defines an optomist as, “someone who thinks everything will be alright, even though they cannot spell.” Oh how I laughed. Enjoy the new (improved) sketch.

So, What’s the PONT?

1. Pencils are an instrument of optimism. Realistically most of us have more failures than sucesses.
2. A pencil, eraser and sheet of paper is the learning from failure ‘starter pack’.
3. Go and buy some pencils. Before it’s too late and AI hype tries to consign them to history.