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LIIDLII KUE/FORT SIMPSON - If they're willing to practice Terry Pamplin is convinced that anyone can draw.

Pamplin, a Yellowknife-based artist, helped some Fort Simpson residents with their drawing skills during a one-day portrait drawing workshop that the Open Sky Creative Society held on Jan. 31.

Mel Sabourin, left, and Vanessa Sanguez use charcoal to sketch a model during a portrait drawing workshop held in Fort Simpson. - Roxanna Thompson/NNSL photo

Most people start drawing and enjoy it when they're young, said Pamplin. If you go into a daycare and give the children crayons and paper they'll all sit down and have fun drawing. No one worries about who's making the best drawing, Pamplin said.

The change comes later in school when people start to judge their own work or have others judge it and often stop drawing as a result, he said.

Anyone can start drawing again even if they've never progressed further than stick figures.

It does, however, take practice and a process of learning to see again, said Pamplin.

The Fort Simpson workshop was an extension of an exhibit of Pamplin's work that was held in the OSC Gallery in October and November.

During the workshop Pamplin focused on observation skills, one of the more critical things in drawing.

It's human nature to learn how to recognize things and then replicate them as cookie cutter images, said Pamplin. People have to train themselves to see the different features in objects, he said.

"It's sort of wakes up the other side of your brain," he said.

Pamplin also had the workshop participants try another technique. Instead of drawing by standing close to the paper and using their hand to hold the medium, the participants were given a metre-long stick with a piece of charcoal taped to the end.

Working from a distance means you have to allow for mistakes and not get hung up on the details. Sometimes the mistakes actually add to the piece, said Pamplin.

Drawing with a stick was different, said Mel Sabourin, one of the participants.

"I can't say I've ever done that before," he said.

Sabourin said he was picking up some new techniques and ideas at the workshop. Although he doesn't normally do portraits, Sabourin said he was having fun.

No matter what happens, drawing should be fun, said Pamplin.

Drawing is as much about observation skills and enjoying it as what you're creating on the paper, he said.

"I think it only becomes unpleasant if you have unrealistic expectations," said Pamplin.