CHAPTER XIX.

HOW TO PREPARE AND GIVE A BOYS’ CHALK-TALK.

A natural taste or talent for art is almost universal. If any of my readers doubt this statement let them supply all the youngsters in their neighborhood with colored chalks and note the result.

My word for it, there will not be a paving-flag, wall or fence in the ward, which offers an opportunity for a picture, which will not be profusely decorated with brilliantly colored, grotesque figures.

We are all Born Artists.

The truth is that the ability and desire to draw, come just as natural to a child as its ability and desire to talk.

That almost all children learn to talk with more or less fluency, while few learn to draw with any approach to skill, is because talking is encouraged and systematically taught from earliest infancy, while drawing is discouraged, and has been ever since the days of old Sakya-Muni, 400 years before the Christian era. Sakya, the narrow-minded old heathen, thought it detrimental to progress in virtue to waste one’s time with pencil or brush. And to-day, in the gray light of the dawn of the twentieth century, boys are often forbidden to draw and few are encouraged in the practice, so that, in fear of punishment, the youngsters give vent to their artistic feelings by slyly decorating the flags, walls, and fences.

Art will never reach the proper standard until these little “chalk-talkers” are encouraged, and taught to handle their chalk with the same skill with which they are taught to use their tongues.

The Name Chalk-Talk

was invented by Frank Beard, D.D., the veteran cartoonist, lecturer, and college professor, and it is the title of his first public lecture, but since then it has grown to be a popular name, so that whenever a speaker illustrates what he has to say by pictures, drawn before the audience, the entertainment is called a chalk-talk.

Besides the ability to stand before an audience and talk, it is absolutely necessary to have some little knowledge of drawing, before one can hope to make a success in this field.

However, any lad, with ordinary ability, can

Learn by Practise

to draw well enough to give an interesting show, suitable for the school-room, Sunday-school, or for a drawing-room entertainment.

For this a good blackboard and a few colored chalks are all the material necessary. The blackboard is a most excellent thing upon which to practise, but it is much better to use large sheets of yellowish-brown paper. This paper is known as chalk-talk paper, and has “tooth” enough to retain the chalk, and make every stroke tell.

Figs. 217 and 218 show how to make a

Drawing-Board,

upon which to fasten the paper. Fig. 217 shows the front view. Fig. 218 the rear view. The drawing-board can be made of any size to suit the artist, but should always be large enough to give full sweep to the arm.

Size of Board.

To get these proportions take a piece of charcoal in your hand and stand at arm’s length from the wall, with your right side toward it, and without changing your position, or leaning forward, make a mark as high upon the wall as you can reach. In the same manner make a mark as low as you can reach, without stooping. Swing your arm from left to right, make two marks midway between and upon each side of the first marks. This will give you the full extent of your reach. It is well to allow a foot more, each way, for a margin. This will give the proper proportion for the drawing-board.

The board must be made of soft, smooth pine boards, so matched that there will be no cracks to annoy you while drawing.

The Height of the Easel

can be obtained by measuring from the floor to the top mark on the wall, and allowing a foot more for the margin.

The easel is made by screwing two leg-boards on the back of the drawing-board (Fig. 217), and then, with a hinge in the middle of the top edge of the drawing-board, attaching the third or hind leg (Fig. 218).

Tack the Paper

securely, at the top and bottom, to the drawing-board, spread your colored chalks out on the table, and group the colors so that they will be handy, and when you want any color you will waste no time seeking that particular lump of chalk (Fig. 219).

Keep a Sharp Knife

handy, on the table, so that as soon as the audience has seen one picture you can run the point of the knife along the bottom of the paper, just above the tacks, free the lower edge of the drawing, throw it up and over the top of the easel, without taking time to detach it at the top. You are then ready to begin upon a new drawing.

The Drawings Themselves

must be simple, but with practice some very effective designs can be made with a few rapid strokes, which at a distance will look like finished paintings. You may

Begin Your Talk

by drawing a vertical line AB (Fig. 220). As soon as this is done you must _step aside, so that all the audience may see_ what you have drawn, and while they are looking at the line tell them that you are going to give them a talk upon the character of lines, and what the lines represent.

AB conveys the idea of

A Stationary Object

--a telegraph pole, a tree, a church steeple, etc. If there is one idea which it does not suggest, that idea is motion.

Draw two lines diagonally down from A to the base line (Fig. 221), and point out that this represents a pyramid, which when resting upon its base is the

Emblem of Stability.

Upon another sheet of paper draw two AB lines, and joining them at the top (Fig. 222), show that these lines still represent a stationary object--a house.

At this point you may work in any comic story of houses in a Western tornado, which, under a stress of weather are not stationary, but seem inclined to change their base and even to fly, etc. Fig. 243 shows how a man becomes a stationary object when the line AB divides him in the centre.

Motion.

But when you slant the AB lines they suggest motion (Figs. 224, 225, and 226).

Although the pyramid is the emblem of stability, when resting upon its base--with the AB line dividing it in the centre--if you take the same form and point the apex in any other direction it immediately suggests motion, as in Figs. 227, 228, and 229.

Not only does it suggest motion, but it tells the direction of the movement suggested. Any child can tell in which direction the arrow and the ducks are flying.

There is

Another Meaning

to this figure. It is a wedge, and means cleaving--entering into--(Figs. 230, 231, 232, and 233). But when one views it from the opposite direction the meaning is just the opposite to a wedge. It now means reception (Fig. 234). The mouse is entering and the alligator is receiving.

Draw All Your Figures as Large as the Paper Will Permit

you to make them; otherwise the audience, or some persons in the back part of the audience, will miss part of your talk, and that will spoil their enjoyment and diminish your applause.

Upon a new sheet of paper draw a horizontal line (Fig. 235), and explain that

This Line Means Repose.

It is the position a person assumes in sleep; it is the surface of the ocean during a calm (Fig. 236).

Here we again have the upright line AB (of Fig. 220), in the mast of the becalmed and immovable ship of Fig. 236. When a squall comes up not only does AB change to a diagonal line (Fig. 237), but the horizontal line, indicating repose, is broken into a series of irregular points, showing noise, movement, and commotion. Figs. 238 and 239 show the same effect of lines.

Something Which Needs Practice,

is the ape; but when you draw it carefully a few times and then practise on it, as you would upon a difficult feat in skating, or any other sport, you can learn to draw the thing in less than a minute. The

Evolution of the Ape

is its growth from a few simple lines. First draw Fig. 240, then add a curved line to the top of the first figure and some wiggles to the bottom (Fig. 241).

A few more strokes of the chalk and we have the comical short legs, long toes, and big thumbs (Fig. 242). Prolong the curve which you drew upon top of the legs until you have an irregular circle (Fig. 243), and on top of the circle fit Fig. 244, the arms of the ape. Make the knuckles rest upon the ground, each side of the feet. From Fig. 246 to Fig. 251, inclusive, is the evolution of the face; but

For Quick Work

most all of the wrinkles shown in Figs. 248 and 251 may be left out. Simply draw the nose and eyes upon Fig. 247 and add the ears, hair, and whiskers (Fig. 250), and it will look ape-like enough to bring applause. When this is finished you have the late lamented Mr. Crowley, of Central Park Zoo (Fig. 252), which will gain sufficient applause to fully repay you for all the time spent in practising on the evolution of the ape.

This will be enough for one talk, and if interlarded with amusing stories and narrations, will not only hold and amuse your audience, but will teach them some real truths in the sign language of drawing, and give them the beginner’s lesson in the meaning of lines.