Making time for spontaneity
I have always had a bit of a battle with sketchbooks! I love the idea of them but I have always struggled with feeling that everything I do must be ‘perfect’. Also, if something works in my sketchbook, I struggle to find the spontaneity to replicate it in a piece of finished art. It’s never the same (or as good!) second time around.
I have, however, been encouraged by a lovely friend to share a drawing from my sketchbook every day on my social media pages. This is a fantastic idea – it will be great to make time to draw every day and I would love that. However, life is busy and work and family commitments won’t allow me that time every day just yet. It is something I am working towards though. I am determined to use my sketchbook more like a diary and have fun capturing moments and things I see around me that inspire me.
I have always used my camera as a kind of sketchbook/record of inspiration. It comes with me often when walking my dog and pretty much everywhere I go. At least these days I can use my mobile if I don’t have it with me! I often work from photos, and although this was frowned upon at university, photography is a useful tool to work from when time is precious and I am not able to sketch something in the moment. I’m rubbish at it, but photography has always been something I’ve enjoyed. I usually manage to get decent enough pictures to draw from. The fact that it is instant means I can record something inspiring to work from later. Life (and the dog if we are out walking!) doesn’t always allow me the time to sit and sketch.
The sketchbook as a journal
So, I am going to follow my friend’s advice when I can, and use my sketchbook more freely and more often.
The other morning I was driving my eldest daughter to school, when three swans flew over, the morning sun lighting up the tips of their wings in silver. It was a breathtaking sight and I had no time to stop and take a photograph. In fact, I don’t think I have the photography skills to take that kind of shot anyway.
I held the image in my mind for the rest of the day, and then when my younger daughter came home from school we decided to do a bit of drawing together, and I recorded it in my sketchbook. It is a new, square, very fat sketchbook I treated myself to on my birthday. It hasn’t got posh paper and there are so many pages that I don’t feel quite so precious about the drawings being perfect.
Incidentally, the sketchbook is a Le Maxi sketchbook which I bought at Astors book shop in Chagford. It is the most beautiful art materials and book shop in gorgeous surroundings on the edge of Dartmoor.
To see more of my finished drawings visit my art and illustration and animal portraits pages.
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