The Sketchbook Project

The past few months I have been working on improving my drawing skills. In order to encourage myself to draw regularly I decided to participate in the Sketchbook Project.

Photograph of an A5 manila envelope with the heading "The Sketchbook Project" balanced on a person's knee with a tin of pencils balanced on top

This is a project set up in New York that aims to act as an archive and library of artists from beginner to professional. You simply fill up one of their sketchbooks, send it back to them and it becomes a part of their collection free for members of the public, schools, art and community groups to browse.
What I particularly like is that, while for me as a random member of the public I had to pay for the book, the sketchbook is sent free to schools and community groups who wish to participate. This makes art and participation n pubic arts projects far more accessible to low income people and not-for-profit groups. Greater accessibility to the arts is something I strongly support - art shouldn't always be treated as a luxury or as something only other people do. It should be something that all people regardless of background or current financial status feel they can be a part of.

photograph of an open text book on the left showing an upside down Picasso sketch and an open sketchbook on the left showing my pencil copy of the sketch

This, somewhat shaky and poorly filmed video gives you a walk through of my sketches, the things I have learned and how I have developed my drawing over the past few months. (video is subtitled in English)

If you like sketching or painting or want to do more art, I would definitely recommend considering getting a Sketchbook Project book to fill in and to contribute to the project. I found that being part of a bigger project was a really great motivation to pick up the book and draw even on days I might not have felt like it otherwise.