i don’t like to yuck people’s yum but i have to say that my least favorite thing to come from the current state of Artists on the Internet is the idea of a sketchbook as something nice and pretty and shareable. like i love me a notebook full of gorgeous art don’t get me wrong but that is NOT what a sketchbook is. a sketchbook is my friend who i carry around everywhere like a purse chihuahua. it is the physical manifestation of my notes app. it is the container into which i wring my brain out. it is my therapist. and most of all it is filled with absolutely terrible sketches that should never see the light of day.
this post is making the rounds again and the amount of people saying that the pretty sketchbooks phenomenon ruined sketchbooks for them is HEARTBREAKING and i stand by my opinion that sketchbooks should be like a jar you put your OCs in. and then you shake them around in there. that’s what they’re for
I used to get really demoralized by all those pretty sketches (and I can imagine HOW demoralizing it is for baby artists barely starting out, when they come online and see something Like That and think they will NEVER be able to reach that kinda level for sketches, and let’s not even talk about actual art then), and you know what?
Here’s some drawings that John Singer Sargent (the man who made the portraits of Madame X, and Dame Ellen Terry as Lady Macbeth, and also ‘Carnation, Lily, Lily, Rose’) did, and I stop feeling bad about my stuff when I see that a world-acclaimed painter did the ‘’terrible’’ kind of sketches, too:
And last but not least, my absolute favourite, nothing will ever top this one:
