This is a drawing I did of an Eames Lounge Chair.  This is not art.  It's more akin to visual dictation or note-taking I think.

The advantage of exercising the brain's natural ability to draw is not in the production of drawings.  Rather it is in what that muscle building does to help your brain do totally other, seemingly non-related, creative tasks.  Sort of like yoga, or weights, or any sport.

What's cool is drawing doesn't take any special kind of talent.  All brains come pre-loaded with the bits to do it.  I discovered this after attending a Betty Edwards "Drawing on the Right Side of Your Brain" class, instructed by her son Brian Bomeisler.  As Brian points out, we don't teach children to read and write to create poets (although that may happen), rather we teach these skills because they are fundamentally powerful tools of thought for amplifying any kind of thinking.  Drawing is in this same category - and some would argue, in the new creative economy, that these tools are even more important.

The thing I'm most excited about with the upcoming iPad is the release of a natural media painting app called Brushes.  If artists can paint New Yorker covers on an iPhone screen, having something the actual size of a piece of paper is going to be heaven!

An interactive surface that lets you capture something as nuanced as a set of brush strokes, or a delicate pencil cross-hatching pattern...well that's something I want in my satchel.  And what is more, it won't even leak paint or graphite dust everywhere!