Getting Arty

 A few years ago I had a go at the 30 Day Sketchbook Challenge, which is run annually by artist Susan Yeates.  Although one can register to receive tutorials from other artists I decided not to and just see the daily prompts on Instagram.  

I started by sketchbook by taking some pages out of an old A5 sketchbook, folding to A6 and sewing the signatures on the fold using pamphlet stitch. So that’s the paper and for the sketching and mark making I am using my collection of graphite pencils, coloured pencils, fine line pens in different colours and a small palette of watercolour paints.   I have been posting onto Instagram daily, which has fed through to Facebook.

Below is the first 4 days

The first day was Fungi, so I drew a Fly Argaric mushroom. I added a mushroom washi tape stamp in the top right corner. I also had an ink stamp of a mushroom so added those to the space. Day two the topic was pens and I drew from my collection of graphite of fine liners and gel pens.  Day three was tea, for which I used a sketch pencil to draw a teapot, mug and tea caddy.  Acorns were the subject for day four. Like day one I also had a washi tape stamp and ink stamp for acorns. I used fine liners in different colours for shading.

The next batch are as follows

Cakes for day five, so I chose a couple of scones with jam and cream. Day 6 was an item less than an inch and I chose a piece from a jigsaw puzzle that was made up over Christmas. I draw around the piece and coloured in with colour pencils. Day 7 was something purple and I drew from my small knitting pouch. Day eight’s subject was exotic fruit and I drew figs from an image from a plant catalogue.

Last collection for now covers days 9 to 12.

Day nine’s theme was glass and I used a Sherry glass and wine glass as a model for these pencil sketches. Day ten was metal and for this I used a twisted wire card holder first with pencil and drawn over with fine liners. Day eleven was underwear and I used my camisole vest (sorry but the days were somewhat cold so taken to wearing a vest under my clothing).  Day twelve is something beginning with L and I used Lego leaves from my flower arrangement Lego kit.

I’m now up to Date 14 now and so far have enjoyed the experience and refreshing to do something for a few minutes on a daily basis.  I hope I can try to keep this up at least until the end of the challenge and maybe beyond,