Tuesday, September 30, 2014

Starting a book for doodling

It seems that lately I've been starting up all kinds of new books that kind of originated in the journal. As you know my journal this year has mostly been a mix and match of all kinds of things. I've been drawing more and doodling more in it and now this has made me want to do books with only drawings and sketchings and ... a book for doodles. I showed you my field notes and the sketchbook I started in previous posts and today I will give you a peek at the doodle book I've begun.

This is the opening page:




The book is a Hahnemühle Sketchbook measuring 25x25 cm (10x10 inches). The paper is quite good and thick and perfect for drawing and less perfect for wet media. But it's okay, since I will not really be painting in it much. My doodling is mostly done with pens and pencils anyway.

I left the inner cover blank, because I may want to make a fabric cover for the book at some later time. The original cover is just black linnen, so not very interesting.

So far, apart from the intro page, I only did one spread:





My goal with this book is basically to loosen up and just play and make pages that make no sense whatsoever. I'm going for stream of consciousness art, haha. It's not easy for me though, being the control freak that I am. However, I think for a first attempt the first spread isn't bad. I like the fastness and messyness of it. Where the opening page took hours and hours of work this whole messy spread was finished within an hour.

I'm hoping this book will allow me to let go of my own preconceptions and just go with the flow of whatever mark I feel like making. We'll see how it goes. I'll keep you posted.

Wishing you all a wonderful and artsy day!