Looking back, I haven’t written about my project, ‘a Watercolour Sketch a Day’ since the 127th day. I’m happy to report that today is Day 406 and I haven’t missed a day yet.
It’s been a fascinating journey and I’m making heaps of mistakes so I must be learning a lot!
So, why pick Day 406 to write about the experience, I mean why not write about it on Day 200, 300 or 400? I noticed that today signifies a slight change in direction…
To explain: When I first started, it was about a Watercolour Sketch a Day, meaning the goal was to create a daily watercolour sketching habit, quick sketches that I could do on say A5 (or smaller) pages.
This was how it was for a time, then I noticed I was attempting larger sketches on A4 and above paper which is fine, but they were taking longer and longer to complete and as I’m not a full-time artist, my time to commit to larger sketches during the week is not as great. Sometimes, I only get a limited time to do them, say 10 – 20 minutes. On the weekends it is longer, mostly.
I also noticed that after a very busy day I was prone to tackling easier subjects, abstract I suppose you could call them which is fine and fun though at times I felt I was doing ‘anything’ just to say that the sketch was done for that day. I don’t want this to be a production, it was meant to be and is fun.
Also, I had gone away from using pencils and pigment liners as well. I want to improve my drawing/sketching skills with the aforementioned tools as well Watercolour paints.
This morning I decided to go back to my original intentions. I started using a pencil again and am doing a smaller size sketch.
One of the challenges I have is that I don’t get out as much as I like to sketch, especially during the week as I run a business, though it is not tied to an office or shop predominantly, per se.
Perhaps I should tuck a Moleskine A5 Watercolour journal and a couple of pencils etc in my portable folder so that if the chance comes up, I could do a quick sketch whilst waiting for an appointment. That would be a great habit to start instead of pulling out the Smartphone and wasting time with that…
Doing a Watercolour Sketch a Day still motivates me and I can certainly say that I am enjoying the journey. Watercolour is such a fascinating medium. Drawing/sketching is fun and it still feels like a kind of meditation for me.
Here are a selection of my Watercolour Sketches since Day 128.
7 March 2020
Communicating Creatively 