Believe it or not, I still remember my first sketchbook, even though it’s been years since I lost it.
It was a basically a notepad, around A6 in size, with a brown, inconspicuous cover, and very thin, fragile paper. It was either given to me by my parents, or I swiped it from the house at some point, because I was a very restless kid, that drew on every available surface, including school property (which almost got me suspended, awful troublemaker that I was).
I still remember some of the drawings I made on it, and I remember people being curious, but not always kind about what I was drawing. Mostly, I remember I had fun with it. And it was the start of the long lasting relationship I still have with sketchbooks.
Even though that first sketchbook must be from around 2003 (I’m old), the only ones that I still keep with me, and haven’t been lost to time, start from the year 2008. A few months ago, in a fit of lunacy, I decided to film every single one of them, while trying to skip as little pages as possible, to share this 15 year old journey through art, through life, and all the changes that time, circumstance, and experience have brought about.
This was partly to share those almost forgotten pages with the world, and keep a record, should anything happen to the originals, and partly to share a very honest and candid version of what sketchbooks look like when you’re not really even trying to make them into anything.
At one point, while flicking through the pages, I mention that I cannot image what it would be like starting to learn how to draw now, in the age of social media – it’s not that Facebook, MySpace, DevianArt, even Instagram, weren’t around in my day, it’s just that right up until high-school, I either didn’t know or didn’t care about the internet as a place to share artwork. It wasn’t nearly as massive as it is now, nor did I grow up with the feeling that unless I was on social media, I did not exist nor matter.
I was making art because I enjoyed it, without feeling any outside pressure to do anything with it. It was a rather pure expression of creative freedom, and one that, even after quitting most forms of social media, I have yet to get back, though not for lack of trying.
In the search for that youthful and innocent joy in simply putting pen to paper, I started exploring different options, perhaps investing more in art supplies and different work methods than I should have, but in the end, resolved to go back to the start, and focus on the sketchbook.
The imperfect, spontaneous, relatively cheap, easy to carry, humble sketchbook.
I looked at my previous sketchbooks, trying to see if there was something about the size that sparked that creativity, maybe something about the paper… the grain? Was it in the supplies I used at the time?
During the video, I also mention that I only made one mistake with my sketchbooks: when I did decide to share my art with the world (on DeviantArt, at the time), I started to slice the pages from the sketchbooks, so they would be easier to scan, and put online.
It sends shivers of regret down my spine just to type it – what a horrible massacre it was, to remove those pages from their starting place. But in the end, a sketchbook is for whatever we want to make of it, and fortunately, even though the pages are no longer next to their original kin, I did save them on a folder, so not all is lost.
Now I think I’m making a different mistake, one that I did not expect to make: I’m using these sketchbooks to bring back something I feel I left along the way.
If there’s anything that I should have learned from 15 years of keeping a sketchbook practice, is that sketchbooks need to serve the purpose that you feel they need to serve at the time. And it’s only normal that that purpose changes, as life keeps changing as well.
There is a lot of content, on and offline, that teaches sketchbooking techniques, and while looking/reading through these is helpful, I’m starting to think that the ultimate point in having a sketchbook, is the same as keeping a journal or an organizer: it’s there when you need it, whether it be for a daily practice, the planning of a big project, or whenever you can spare the time.
I would love to get back to using my sketchbooks as the almost daily creative escape they once were, but maybe, just for right now, that is not what they need to be.
I am yet to find out what they need to be… And while I try to find out I’m playing with shapes, mediums, different themes, and challenges.
I’m not exactly sure where I’m going from here, but I will try to look at what I’ve done so far with satisfaction, rather than regret, and look at the empty blank pages of my sketchbooks with compassion and excitement, rather than fear and unnecessary expectations.
