Despite previous struggles with sketchbook practice, and how to do it “correctly” (ha, there’s a clue!), I spotted an interesting class:

• Online — perfect!
• An artist whose work I love: Cheryl Taves
• Only 30 days
• Reasonable price

I’d already tweaked some of my sketching habits: getting out of sketchbooks and onto loose paper, taking a break on the weekend. But I thought: I can do a month, right? And what a month it was: Omicron was everywhere, and why not use this class structure to occupy my time & brain?

The class implied a sketchbook as the norm, and even had instructions for prepping it. Nope, I stuck with my plan, and chopped 15 sheets of 9×12 watercolor paper in half. Ready! And I still took at least Sunday off, doubling up one or two of the days as needed.

Another key element of the class: sharing was optional. And in fact, Cheryl advised, if sharing makes you critical of your efforts, don’t! Oh, how I love this! So, off I went through all 30 days, without a single completed image on social media. I worked on each image & prompt at a time, jotting down thoughts as I went.

Sketches & Prompts

But now, it’s time to look, and evaluate. Here’s how it turned out, now that I’m ready to share. (Click to play a short video)

Observations

Well, if you’re stretching outside your comfort zone, as many of these prompts nudged me to do, there are some you’re not gonna like! I like the 2nd half much better, myself, but all of it is good information.

I solidified a bunch of thinking about my personal, go-to imagery. Horizon lines, no surprise here, represent the future, and choice, for me. Serpentine lines, like rivers or just paths, are similar: they are going somewhere! And grids and straight lines show up to represent the order and structure I attempt to impose on my life. Scratches and asemic writing stand in for decisions taken, notes made, especially as layers, recording changes we make as we go. And I figured out stripes: as horizontal lines, they’re graduated hills, but as vertical lines, they’re abstracted tree trunks!

The most impactful information is that my ability to be curious & experiment doesn’t work if I think it’s going to matter, or be shared ahead of time. In fact, I’m such a completer that I need to sketch AFTER my to-do list is in better shape for the day. The things I can discover when I mess around just before cleaning up are the most free, unrestricted elements.

Some ideas to keep:

• A constant stream of sketch exploration.
• Work that’s easy to scan. Going off the edge doesn’t help, but a ragged edge inside is interesting.
• Trying new materials
• Exploring stripes, vertically and horizontally
• Sketching after the to-do list is checked off

Some ideas to ditch:

• Working on one piece at a time
• Working to “warm up”. I’m too tempted to do something just to get it done.
• Working on rectangles? I would love to go back to squares talking to each other, as in my Pandemic Pairs project.
• Working for just one day. Sketches for me are just a starting point, not one day’s worth. I want to go back to covering them with more layers on other days, working in series back & forth.

Well, it’s time to apply these concepts to my art process. It’s always tough to emerge from the comforting structure of a class, where you always know what you’re doing next, or at least trying. But I think I have a few ideas here, fuel for the creative fire going forward. I hope you have a similar source of creative inspiration to draw from. And if not, at the moment, I highly recommend this class!