Sketchbook Monday

There are some artists who are really into sketchbooks and some who couldn't care less. I belong firmly in the first camp. I carry mine with me almost constantly and will spend hours on mindless doodling, which isn't really mindless at all is it? My best ideas have been unconscious scribblings done in classrooms and subway cars. My most beautiful gestures are always the ones I unselfconsciously render on a whim. When I am done with a sketchbook it is a wonderfully compact object in and of itself, which not only contains the architecture of my ideas, but a visual representation of my head-space during the time the book was kept.

I also find few things as pleasurable as pouring over someone else's sketchbooks, and inevitably, no matter how much I love a painter, I always love their drawings more. There's always something amazing about the stuff that's not supposed to count as much.
Yesterday I was cleaning out my closet and I found my sketchbook collection. I have saved dozens of books of my drawings since college and it's really awesome comparing the difference between them. While perusing my own books I realized that since I love it when other people post their sketchbook pages I should probably do the same.

And so every Monday, from this week forward, I will be posting a sketchbook page. I will try and keep it current, but today's will be one I liked the look of yesterday while I was cleaning up.


Date: Summer 2009