Thank you for your report!
We have received your report and it is currently under investigation by a forum moderator.
Rediscovering
Welcome to the forum.
Here you can discuss all things art with like-minded artists, join regular painting challenges, ask questions, buy and sell art materials and much more.
Make sure you sign in or register to join the discussions.
Hang on Studio Wall
This is a Studio member-only feature!
Join our Studio membership and save your favourite Painters Online content, from gallery artwork to step-by-step guides, to your own online mood boards. Create your go-to place for inspiration and learning. Plus, members can also enjoy a range of exciting features including monthly art videos and a digital magazine library.
If you are already a Studio member, simply login to your account.
Not a Studio member? Why not try our free 30-day trial - no commitment, no credit card required
Message
Posted
I have sketch since I could hold a pencil, but like most things life got in the way , need to work , have a family etc etc. I started again when I was in hospital and had nothing to do, then watercolour painting came along and that became my passion and still is.
I recently started a sketch book of horses for my younger granddaughters, as all little girls the love horses. This has lead to three book , horses, old vehicles and one of old trees etc. What is apparent is how my sketching is improving, through regular use, not only that but the subject are growing.
My passion for sketching had been rekindled, I can’t think of anything so simple ax a pencil and paper for creating a piece of art . A pencil in your fingers is a great feeling , and very rewarding, we should be encouraging our children to learn and hopefully they will develop their skills and see things a bit different.
Posted
I totally agree Dixie. Overtime I've acquired lots of art materials, but the pencil has always been the favourite. I like pens too. If it comes to it all I really need is a pencil, pen and sketchbook. Sketchbooks came relatively late in my art activities, previously drawing on odd sheets of paper...many of which got dumped over time. These days I always have several sketchbooks on the go...six at the moment...like you I've found it helps to keep some for a theme. At the moment I have one for drawings in blue pencil, another for styles of art I don't usually try, one for fantasy and sci-fi subjects, and another for dip pens. (The dip pen is a 'rediscovery' for me, years ago I used them all the time. Modern pens are easier to use, but I love the variety of line available with dip pens.)
Having set various 'subjects and mediums' for these books helps me when I get stuck.
Posted
I have just started themed sketches pads and find it useful, I use with one I’m in the mood for if that makes sense.
I’ve nit really given pens a fair amount of time to be able to appraise turn fairly. I do love the ordinary pencils and graphite sticks, I also have some water soluble graphite pencils thst I do like to use occasionally. It’s my intention to get out and sketch more over the coming year , there are a few places I have in mind and follow up, with a painting. I am getting involved with a few charities that work in the local woodlands and have a nature reserve nearby, so there should be lots of opportunities to sketch and paint. It will involve me teaching other the basics of sketching and watercolour painting, looking forward to it all happening. I do enjoy showing other how to draw , it very rewarding when someone tell you that they are enjoying learning and you can see them develop.
Posted
I love my sketch books and only have to look back at them to relive happy times. I look through mine and realise I have done a lot people , in queues ,in bard ,on the beach all over the place mainly done in pen and a watercolour wash.
Your girls will so enjoy your horses Paul. And what a great idea getting other people into the habit . I like my Moleskine but they are not the cheapest option Seawhite of Brighton do a good one at a cheaper price A5 and I have used water colour successfully in them.
Lew ……what have you binned over the years? Divi .
Posted
I have dozens of them - some pretty awful drawings in a lot of them, as you'd expect when you're just basically trying out a composition, or seeing if you actually CAN draw something (at times, I couldn't). Thing is, though, they all mean something to me - I can be whisked back to a baking hot day in 1976, and do something with the composition of the drawing which I couldn't do back then. I can re-visit my old dogs, and even though I didn't do a very good job of him, my grand-dad, who left us in '78. I used a lot of coloured pencil, and pen and ink, back then - they remind me that I could still do that now. I can find portraits of The Great Ralph (TM) our first and most splendiferous rat.
Your sketch-books don't need to be filled with finished works of art - some of mine look as if a ten year old had got hold of a block of shoe-polish and attacked the paper with it. Doesn't matter - not all ideas work, and you're not going to know that if you don't rough 'em in. I do wonder where some of my drawings have gone, though - very early stuff.... did I turf it out? Did my mother? Did she find the naughty drawings and chuck the lot out.....? (Well, one was young once..)
Posted
I have binned so many good sketches , due to moving so regularly I just threw stuff away or gave it away.
I do wish I had kept the sketch I did in places like Aden and the Far East , didn’t paint them but I could make use of them now , particularly as so many places have changed in the last forty or fifty years. I do have a clear out every so often but I’m far more selective about what goes in the bin.
Posted
Like you I have kept sketch books for many years all shapes and sizes I also kept a diary so decided to amalgamate the two and have kept a sketch journal ever since I'm just coming to the end of journal number 61 and try to do a drawing a day..I also love to teach and run a weekly class which has been running since I retired 18 years ago the more I draw the more work I get from the class...
Posted
Interesting stuff.
Sylvia, I've always drawn, I had a few cheap drawing pads that fell to pieces over time. I prefered to buy a pack of the better quality typing paper (it came in packs of 50). I'd end up with wads of drawings, I'd sift through, keep a few, dump the rest. Then I'd move house and have a thorough clear out. I'm talking about quick sketches, doodles, and the occasional more finished drawing. A few years back I read about artists making highly finished drawings in their sketchbooks, the author called them 'mini galleries'. I liked this idea, and began to use sketch books...not everything in them is highly finished, but most is. This works for me because drawing (from imagination) is my first love. I don't consider myself a painter, I draw things, sometimes I colour them with a variety of water based mediums. So now I have a few filled sketchbooks, and currently have six sketchbooks 'on the go.'
I like Bari's idea of a visual diary, and thought about starting one. But I knew I'd never keep it up, I'm not that sort of artist.
Posted
I was looking through some sketch pads (mostly A5) recently for ideas and had forgotten much of what was in some of them.
As a child my dad used to bring home rolled up plans when he had finished with them. He was a heating and ventilation engineer, and I used to draw endlessly on the reverse side-good quality paper as I remember and probably about 5’x3’.
The supply of good free rolls of paper just kept coming! He also painted in oils and I remember him preparing his own canvases and buying those old style issues of The Artist magazine shown here recently. Incidentally I remember that all the little figures I drew were playing outdoors, running, jumping, kicking balls etc, no mobile phones in every hand, just action!
As Lewis has said, all you really need is a pencil or pen and some paper, and for quite a while during lockdown walks I took a small pad in my pocket and stopped when something took my eye, a good habit which I’ve let drop more recently.
Interesting to read everyone else’s ideas and memories on this.
Edited
by Tessa Gwynne