Love a challenge!

10 Feb

Another 100 days

Once or twice a year I take on a ludicrous but entertaining art challenge. It's always an interesting journey. I've had some that have failed miserably because I just wasn't in the right space or at all organised. Others have been an adventure. In 2013 I created pop-up sketchbook diary for The Sketchbook Project whilst it was still a fairly new concept. I filled a sketchbook with watercolour painted scenes from our busy family life with three young kids, painstakingly cutting them out with a scalpel and constructing them into pop-ups. It's seems amazing to me now that I did all that work just for the fun of it but it's one of those projects I hope with live on. When it was finished I posted it off to New York apparently to never see it again. My daughter has always promised me that she'll find it one day in the Brooklyn Art Library where it now lives.

Two years later I found myself participating in the 52 Week Illustration Challenge and creating pop-ups again. Now that really was a crazy amount to put on myself and I don't think I finished it. But looking back on the work I created, some of it was really delightful.

Animals in Hats

Last April I set myself the challenge of drawing animals in hats for 100 days whilst participating in #the100dayproject. It was the start of the Covid19 outbreak and I started the project with glorious naive optimism hoping that the world would all be back to normal by the time the project was over. As things progressed that optimism turned to sarcasm. But I had a lot of fun making some ridiculous pictures and connecting with other artists along the way.

Here We Go Again...

So, it's time for another 100 day challenge. This time I'm using it as an opportunity to put my iPad pro to work and explore what I can do in Procreate. All the work will be shared on instagram through reels as well as posts. I just love the way Procreate records your drawing and allows you to make groovy little movies easily. I don't need any encouragement here because I use the iPad literally all the time. But there's something really special about the way a challenge can make you create surprising work. Without the pressure of a deadline and expectations from a client you have the freedom to play. I think I read that from something Elise Hurst wrote and it stuck.

100 Days of Character Sketches

I'm up to Day 11 and loving it so far. It's great to have the freedom to just discover another character each day without rules or prompts. The 52 Week Illustration Challenge or Inktober are great if you need a bit of a kick to get you started, but I've learnt to love the blank page and let things evolve.