Where did February go? Is it gone already?

Recently, I saw a video on Instagram where a person was talking about sketchbooks and how artists shouldn’t call books with ‘finished‘ artwork a sketchbook.
The video annoyed me, but I wanted to think about it first.

What I share is often unfinished, and unpolished, … so I assume the video doesn’t apply to me, but still… The main argument was that calling an item with finished work a sketchbook, would scare off beginners and set the bar too high.

My take:
– Nobody should tell artists what they can and cannot do with their sketchbooks.
– It’s up to an artist to decide if they make quick doodles, ugly drawings, finished pieces, or work that looks like a finished work to someone who feels intimidated but what actually can be a study for said artist.
– Artists are free to share the work they want to share.
– When people are intimidated by sketchbooks from other artists, instead of trying to police those artists, they need to work on their insecurities. It’s not the responsibility of an artist to take care of everyone’s insecurities.

In February, I wanted to focus on building layers with different materials. I started with some challenges by Emma C, which evolved into a newfound love for… pan pastels! I kid you not 🙂

Scribbling materials over each other:

Slowly building from light to dark, testing what works well:

An orange themed session with Katie, getting the pan pastels out!

Drawing monkeys with Emma. halfway this session I had to switch to a different sketchbook- a new brand always exciting.

Drawing art materials with Katie (I just received the order of markers here):

And a super fun chicken session!

I wasn’t sure about the butterfly theme. Just like flowers, I find butterflies too pretty and sweet. But I went all in without any expectation, only an intention to try and do it my way.

The negative space session with Emma felt more natural to me. Normally we would do 2 longer timers (I think 30min each) but I went for as many quick sketches as possible:

My daily dog drawing project on DOGvision.eu is still going strong!

Back to landscapes:

Monday morning still lives with Emma:

And a page from the art journal: