Everyday Everyday: A Thing.



So, I'm kind of doing a Thing.

Like most Things I end up doing, I didn't really mean for it to be A Thing.  

I swear, all my best ideas end up coming about from offhanded stuff.  The stuff I plan meticulously?  Never happens, never catches on with me.  Stuff I come up with at three a.m. and think hey that might be cool, I'll just do it and think about it as I go along, always ends up being awesome.

There's a lesson in there for me, I think.

Anyway, the Thing.

I'm still trying to make sketching an every day habit.  And while I've been doing it quite regularly, I noticed I've been relying a lot on drawing from references.  

Now, there's no shame in that.  Every sketch makes you a better sketcher.  I truly believe that.

But my sketchbooks were starting to look a little, I dunno, sanitized maybe.  Like, "here is my pretty drawing of XYZ", instead of what I really LIKE to look back on, which is the stuff in my life.  When I look back at old sketchbooks, the entries that grab me aren't the well-rendered landscapes or detailed watercolors, even ones that come from my own imagination.

What grabs me are the stupid things.  The empty Dr. Pepper can on my desk in watercolor.  The sketches of my dogs sleeping, even though they look kind of like cookies that someone's only half-baked.  Studies of flowers I've brought in from outside, or drawn while I was out there.

I like to look back on the stuff that's my everyday life.



So I started on May 1st, drawing my everyday life, every day.

They're sketches, and I don't care if they look good, so there's no pressure.  It's just me, a pen, and my life.   Sometimes, that's collections of things.  Sometimes it's more than one drawing on a page.  Sometimes it's an actual story.

But it's all mundane, everyday life, examined closely and recorded.  It's becoming one of my most cherished daily practices.


I'm kind of loving it a little.

2 comments:

  1. I love the everyday notebook thing. Maybe one of these days I'll get to something like that. I'm still trying to find my style, my art voice, whatever you want to call it, so I feel like I can't just make art yet, I gotta work up to it. I'm having fun experimenting and trying new things.

    ReplyDelete
  2. The "having fun" part is the most important bit. :D

    ReplyDelete