It’s been a long time since I went sketching a model, too long that’s for sure, but this single evening turned into a project in different steps, materials and outcomes.

Our model was the charismatic Trixie Divine  who posed for about 3 hours in different postures of 3, 5 or 10 minutes. Keeping the times short is a great help to me for working fast and letting go of perfection and control.
Sketch materials I brought:
– A3 paper white & recycled
– Moleskine sketchbook A5
– pencils
– colored pencils (just 2 or 3 colors)
– graphite stick
– little plastic bottle with water
– 1 brush
– watercolors
– pocket knife (for sharpening as some pencils break in a normal sharpener)
I like to take different types of papers to be able to change materials quickly so that when the alarm goes off for a new pose, I can start immediately on a new sketch without having to wait until my paint is dry.
Starting the evening, I was struggling to get into it. Drawing is clearly a practice that you need to keep working on. Always. And drawing trees is quite different from drawing a woman 🙂
As time and poses went by, I got more comfortable and relaxed. It seemed like I found more time within the same time frame. Sounds silly, I know, but it’s more about how you use the time well and not wasting it on overthinking.
But even more important, this drawing session lighted another spark. These sketches didn’t have to be the final result. When you look at sketches as bricks to built new things with, there is so much more that you can do with it! Since printmaking is my thing, I decided to start with dry point etches and simultaneously preparing a screen print.