14 Years in the Making

More than 14 years and finally filled

Through summer, my mission to complete partially filled sketchbooks continued, but at a much slower pace. That’s because I was mostly sketching on location, and those unfinished sketchbooks had all been rejected from field sketching for good reason. I had no intention of using them during prime outdoor-sketching time! Now that the Big Dark has begun, however, I’m doomed to doomscrolling unless I make a concerted effort to avoid it (which I plan to do). My doomscrolling prevention program is still an ideal time to burn through less-than-ideal sketchbooks.

Dated 2/22/12, this sketch on the first page was made long
before my pandemic series of hand sketches!

With some recent sketches made from photos, I finally filled the last pages of this very old spiralbound, hardcover Stillman & Birn Delta sketchbook – one of the first sketchbooks I ever began. In 2012, my first full year of sketching, I didn’t know yet what materials I liked, so I was trying everything. This book had three counts against it: It’s spiralbound, the paper is ivory, and it’s a heavy hardcover. I found only one sketch in it that I had made on location. I must have learned quickly that it was too heavy to haul around, especially with a spiral binding.

The sketch on page 1 is dated Feb. 22, 2012. After using it sporadically through 2016, filling a little more than half its pages, I abandoned it until this year. It’s especially nostalgic to see so many still lives made in the winter months when I was fully committed to drawing from life.

My goal (maybe more like wishful thinking) early this year was to fill all my uncompleted sketchbooks by year’s end. I don’t think I’m going to make it – I have at least three or four more to go – but it’s always satisfying to put another one up in the filled-book bookcase.

This sketch, dated 5/16/12, is the only one in the book made on location. I see that I turned the square book so that the spiral binding was on top -- a good solution for getting it out of the way.

2/13/13 Mostly still lives made with media experiments fill the first half of the book.

11/26/13 This was part of a fun still life series made of objects in alphabetical order.

8/21/14 My beloved first Rickshaw Zero Messenger Bag

2/12/26 A media experiment from a photo