Mark Kistler's Draw Squad

Mr Kistler could easily have spread this content into 15 volumes, charged three times the price, and I would have bought every one and been pleased as punch. Instead, this book is one big fat feast at an incredible bargain! It is page after page of immediately applicable lessons wrapped up in fun, inspiring personality. Buy two copies: one for yourself, and one to donate somewhere where it will find it’s way into the hands of a teacher or bright young artist. Big thanks to Mr Kistler. <3

I bought this as a replacement for a book that's seen better days. I've been enjoying this book since high school (I'm now almost 40!) and I still enjoy it.

Kistler's step by step journey through the acquisition of drawing skills offers constant positive reinforcement and builds self esteem.The alphabet of drawing skills learned rather painlessly, will be a source of joy for a lifetime; but the attitude of tolerance and acceptance which permeates the work is a basis for a happy life.I bought this book for myself, because I have never felt very good about my drawing skills, even though I have been doing art work for quite a few years. The effect has been more than I had hoped for. I like my art better. I am planning to continue with another drawing course when I finish Kistler's work.Do read all the reviews here. They are very useful in describing various aspects of this book. Anyone who has time to spend with children and would like it to be quality time will enjoy using this book.

As a fourth-grade teacher who was never very good at art, I always found teaching art to be very difficult. Elementary school teachers aren't provided with any real curriculum, and the majority of ideas out there in books and teachers' magazines are simplistic cut-and-paste busy work that don't really teach any art concepts. Then I found this book! This is incredible! My whole art program is set up around this book! It teaches art concretely and step-by-step so that the most art challenged students (including myself) are able to learn from it! The kids love it, and its great for teaching mathematical and geometrical concepts like shapes, angles and terms. I couldn't recommend this book for any teacher (or child, or parent) more! You and your children will draw great pictures, even if you are as bad at drawing as I am!

I am an parent volunteer/Art Docent in a rural public school; I present art lessons to a fairly rowdy group of fifth-graders. This book makes it a breeze! Some if these kids (sadly) were already afraid to draw. "I can't draw" they told me. "I'm no good at art." How tragic! But with the help of this book and weekly 1/2 hour sessions, these kids are drawing like mad. They are proud of their creations and can't wait to show me their "practice creatures". I plan to buy 3 more copies of this book to place in the fifth grade classrooms. These lessons are so simple, the teachers could pull out the books and Poof! instant art lesson. This makes a great Class Reward...a productive way to spend that stray 1/2 hour. The kids are learning but are having a blast!(I'm learning right along with them!) If only all learning could be this painless.

*This book is for EVERYBODY. Elementary school children will take to it with no reservations or inhibitions; Kistler knows how to prepare and motivate his readers to just dive right in. Adults (I am 44) will discover that the ONLY prerequisites for learning to draw fluently are a few 3B pencils, a cheap sketchpad -- and Kistler's book. The lesson/exercises could not be more easy, painless, or fun. If you go through the entire book as I did -- once you start, it's almost impossible to stop -- you will have accumulated an impressive collection of well-drawn doodles, sketches, vignettes, illustrations -- and at least one gigantic mural. And YOU are the artist.Kistler doesn't teach you merely to "copy" figures, he gives you insanely simple projects that become a kind of alphabet / repertoire for assembling a larger, more grandiose project, and then he exhorts you to go and do just that. And you do go out and do it, because now you can. You don't just learn to draw objects, you acquire the ability to visually invent, create, generate and connect pictorial ideas and expand on artistic themes. By the time you get half-way into the book, you begin to see your dining room wall as a nice place for your own "Guernica" mural or "Historical Pageant of the Milky Way Galaxy". By the end of the book, you understand why Michaelangelo couldn't just paint the Sistine Chapel beige with a roller and quit at five o'clock.RDB