As I am going through with my daily sketch exercise this year, I am starting to explore a variety of surfaces and tools to see which combo I enjoy the most and also to see if anything distinct emerges for me stylewise. I felt that the differences will stand out the most to me if I studied the same subject. So, I started with a small glass bowl of strawberries with the intention to graze between somewhat realistic to more deliberate distortions. Along the way, I had a few unexpected realizations that were pretty intense and did not stay within the simple bounds of paper and tools as I set out to explore originally!
I started with a HB 2 pencil (the yellow ones kids use in school) and sketched the simple lines of my object on copy paper. What may seem obvious and something I tend to forget often is that staying with super basic supplies takes away any fear or guilt of making mistakes and actually frees me up to experiment. It is also an excellent warm up.
I usually like to draw things out with pencil but decided to go straight in with my Faber-Castell Ecco Pigment Black 0.1 pen on 75 lb smooth white cardstock this time. The pen glided beautifully on the paper as long as I didn’t hesitate. Whenever I felt nervous, my lines quivered. The lines mocked me and I had to add some quick touches of watercolor – LOT of water, very little paint.
Not having pencil lines to guide me made me feel almost blind and anxious. Sounds silly, doesn’t it? But that’s how I really felt.
Then I took the strawberries out and placed them at various angles before me and did a more gestural take using Winsor & Newton Artist quality Watercolors and soft round # 4 brush by Loew- Cornell on 140 lb Canson Watercolor paper. This 5-minute exercise helped loosen things up a bit for me and dissipate the discomfort I felt while using the pen directly on paper.
While my watercolors were out, I decided to do a full study, shadows and all. I stayed with what I saw before me in terms of lines, colors, details, light and shadow using the same watercolors, brush and paper as the gestural strawberries. If I wanted this to be perfectly realistic, I would have to spend a lot more time on it. So, I settled for more or less accurate and not overwork it to death.
Next, I pulled out my Faber-Castell ArtGRIP Aquarelle watercolor pencils and decided to deliberately push away from realism. I distorted the perspective of the bowl and the shapes of the strawberries as much as I felt comfortable doing. I had a lot more fun with coloring it in with the watercolor pencils and then blending with water. From the bowl to the seeds, I saturated the colors and made bolder marks and liked that it looked weird and still looked like a bowl of strawberries.
By now, I really wanted to eat the strawberries but resisted the temptation for just one more study using Faber-Castell ArtGRIP coloring pencils on Canson 50 lb smooth sketch paper. After a quick sketch with the HB 2 pencil, I started coloring. I wanted to find something in between the two watercolor studies I did, in terms of colors and shapes and this is where I ended up.
When I placed the studies next to each other, I saw the differences in the looks. I found that I like the colors soft, the lines steady and the reality slightly redefined.
Toward the end of 2017, I got an email from Jamie Ridler and Meghan Genge. They had a wonderful plan. They were reaching out to artists to send encouragement to fellow artists who sometimes lose their way (don’t we all?). These notes of encouragement were to be send as emails at no cost to anyone who signed up. It was called Love Letters from Trail Makers and I was invited to create a Love Letter.
Jamie and I came to know each other after my first Creativebug Facebook Live class and she interviewed me for her podcast Creative Living with Jamie. When this invitation came, I didn’t know what to say in words. I wondered what would I tell myself when I get stuck. So I created a visual message: Trust your imagination! When I started creating this blog post about my location sketching, I began to think that maybe my story could make sense to someone and encourage her or him to hang in there, creatively speaking. Mine is an everyday kinda story of a girl who grew up in a traditional Indian family, fulfilling her parents’ expectations and then her husband’s and all along remained attached to a simple hobby of drawing which no one took seriously. Read on and maybe you’ll resonate.
There was a time when I was about 8 or 9 and I drew everything in sight in my homemade sketchbooks. No blank piece of paper was safe if I could get my hands on a pencil, pen or any mark making device! I was not shy and I had no care about what other people thought of my drawings. People carried cameras and I carried my sketchbooks. I sat and I drew. Hours would pass by and I would keep filling the pages of my drawing books.
Then there was the time when I was 13 or 14 and I was shy to sit and draw in public. I restricted myself to drawing what I could see through the windows and balcony of our flat in the city. That shyness evaporated when I visited my grandma in the country and the change of scene was invigorating. My aunt would complain to my mom that I brought with me so few clothes. There was no space in the suitcase after I filled it with all the drawing paper I could fit.
As time went on, life got busier and busier. In my 20s, it was no longer possible to set time aside for reading, sketching and the like. It was not possible to keep drawing without making all the new people in my life – my husband, in-laws, new friends through my husband feel downright ignored. And then bags had to be packed with diapers, several changes of baby clothing, food and more. There was no more space for sketchbooks. Life had expanded in fascinating ways and even though there was no time to sketch, the amazing experiences were marinating inside while waiting to find the thread back to the surface.
Before long, the babies grew up to be children and there were many commutes to places for them to learn to swim, dance, do martial arts, make things in STEM club and there was waiting. It was BEAUTIFUL – pockets of time that were solely mine on most days and right there was the other end of that lost thread. As I packed for the kids, I packed a bag for myself as well with just the basics – a journal, a pen and a water bottle.
As travel became a requirement for my work, I took a sketchbook along and I drew at the airport, on the plane, in the taxi, on the go. I narrowed my essentials down to a no-objection-from-anyone-content-and-size and I resumed sketching on location, aware and unaware of my surroundings at the same time.
I take my time to draw. I don’t always finish on location. I take pictures with my phone for reference if I have to. But I carry on. When I can, I listen to audio books while I sketch. I try to find ways to do all the things that I can’t not do without neglecting everything I must do.
And I don’t judge myself. Or compare with others. They are where they are and I am where I am. That is that.
Some drawings turn out okay, many don’t. I am happy for doing it. And that in itself feels like a gift – the gift of creative expression.
Here are some sketches I did on location.
If you resonate with my story or feel that it inspired you in any way, leave me a comment.
Did you know that Creativebug is having a Black Friday sale? And that means if you sign up between 11/22 and 11/29, you get the first three months of subscription for just $1. This sale only happens once a year and it ends on 11/29!
At Creativebug you’ll find over a thousand classes, with new ones added every week, covering various types of crafts from Art and Design to Holiday and Party and almost everything in between
There are mixed media and art journaling classes as well. I have taught the following classes at Creativebug and currently preparing to shoot more classes early next year.
Here’s a tutorial to show you how to use a coloring book page in an art journal.
The coloring page I used is from “At the Beach”, a printable coloring book of fond beach memories It is a fun collection of 30 hand-drawn images that bring back memories of that carefree sun-soothed, surf-soaked beach vacation. It includes a bonus section of inspiration to help you bring the black-and-white pen drawings to life in full color!
When we lived in Florida, I didn’t think I could miss summer… ever! But when we moved north, I found cold weather for most of the year. Even though we have pretty beaches here too, the drive is longer and the water much colder. All of a sudden summer days and our trips to the beaches became a lot more precious to me.
As I washed sand off the beach toys, I felt that soon this summer too will be a thing of the past and we can only hold on to its memories. And I wanted to re-live these moments and cherish the fond memories we made. To do so, I compiled my drawings inspired by our beach vacations – things we saw, things we shopped for, things we did, and created a coloring book named At the Beach. At the Beach is a printable coloring book of fond beach memories. It includes a fun collection of 30 hand-drawn images that bring back memories of carefree sun-soothed, surf-soaked beach vacations. Plus, there’s a bonus section of inspiration to help you bring the black-and-white pen drawings to life in full color!
In this coloring book, you’ll findcute flip flops, stylish swimsuits, the dyed woven straw beach bag with raffia fringes which we ended up not buying as it wasn’t big enough, the rose colored sun glasses I bought at St. Maarten and many more. At the Beach will surely help you re-live YOUR beach vacations and enjoy the special summer memories a while longer.
I’ll email you the printable PDF within 24 hours of purchase. No shipping fee, no waiting for the mail to step into coloring bliss!
You know how much I love taking my printable coloring book pages beyond the book! Here’s a video tutorial showing you how you can do it too. Plus, I walk you through a few pens that I’m enjoying using on my art journal pages at the moment. I hope you enjoy!
