Undrawing 6 drawings

The first video recorded the undrawing of 6 drawings.

The second video is the exact same video, but play in reverse.


Undrawing Doodeo Page 9472 to 9477 from Pixo Hammer on Vimeo.


Unerasing Doodeo Page 9472 to 9477 from Pixo Hammer on Vimeo.

Sketchy Doodeo 9975

Sketchy Doodeo 9975 from Pixo Hammer on Vimeo.

See finished drawing.

20 Drawings Doodeo 080327

These 20 drawings were done in a single session, non-stop, in 70 minutes. The playback here was compressed into 9 minutes. There was no planning ahead of time on what to draw. The drawings just came out the way they are. The accompanying music was by Manicure.

Correction: There is actually only 19 drawings. I thought I did 20.


20 Drawings Doodeo 080327 from Pixo Hammer on Vimeo.

Painterly Doodeo 080323b

Painterly Doodeo 080323b from Pixo Hammer on Vimeo.

View completed painting.

Sketchy Doodeo 9976

Sketchy Doodeo 9976 from Pixo Hammer on Vimeo.

View completed drawing.

Drawing A-B-C

I came across this wonderful video through Drawn.ca.

I have never thought there can be so much drama in watching a child painting the alphabets.

This video also happens to be an excellent illustration of my ideas on ...

1) Writing being a form of Drawing (illustrated by young Gradus W. Wouters on the left), and ...

2) Drawing being a form of Writing (illustrated by Job Wouters on the right).

How I wrote a drawing

I have a stack of old business cards with the blank side filled with hand-drawn "writing parts". I use them as flash cards.

A number of cards was randomly drawn. In this case, I picked 5.

The "writing parts" on these cards formed the "seeds" to "grow" the drawing. They were applied to the drawing in the order that they were drawn from the stack.

What eventually got put into the drawing was not limited to the selected cards. These cards merely served as a device to get the drawing going. How the drawing evolves and finishes depended more on how the mind - and the hands - respond to the drawing in progress. Below is the finished drawing.

Draw a Writing / Write a Drawing

This is my personal "theory and practice" for drawing abstract line art.

1) Writing is a form of drawing.

All of us have "drawn" writings. It happened when we first learnt to lay down the strokes of an unfamiliar handwriting. The scenario can be a child learning to write A-B-C for the first time, or a Westerner learning to write Chinese or Kanji characters.

2) Drawing is a form of writing.

All of us have also "written" drawings. We call them stick figures. The convention is simple. The head is drawn as a circle. Body, arms and legs are simple straight lines.

3) The Theory

Drawing stick figures is no different from writing A-B-C.

To "write" more elaborate drawings, we need more "writing parts" - besides circles and straight lines, and be adventurous in how to put these parts together.

Just as we are capable of learning A-B-C and drawing stick figures, (my theory says) all of us are also capable of creating complex abstract line art - by treating it as a form of writing.

4) In Practice

Based on this theory, I have been experimenting with drawings that I collectively refer to as the The 10,000 Page Colouring Book. Through the experimentation process, I began to establish a set of frequently used "writing parts".

Undrawing 9654

Systematic erasing (left) and unerasing (right) of an abstract line drawing.

Unerasing 9690

IF: Grow

"Grow" is often the term I use when I think about drawing. I see drawings as results of spontaneous growth of lines. To turn that growing process into performances that I can sit back and watch, I take finished drawings and rework them into videos. Below is an example.

Unerasing Doodeo 9690 from Pixo Hammer on Vimeo.