This is How I Kept Drawing for (Almost) a Year

Turns out We Make the Rules!

This week the 365th day of my daily drawing quietly went by. But as it turns out, 365 days don’t always equal one calendar year. That’s because I broke the rules! Can you believe that? What an outrageous thing to do.

I started the daily drawing with the 3 Materials Drawing Challenge that was organised on Instagram last year¹. The challenge was to draw for 50 days and my plan was to develop the habit and then continue drawing. It worked! I kept picking up my sketchbook every day.

A very hot day at the beach in Dorset last weekend

A few months in I missed a drawing day. Life took over that day and I didn’t realise I forgot to draw. I only remembered the next morning and I was soooooo sad. I’ve been doing so well! Why did I stop? Now that I skipped a day none of it counts! I felt disappointed as if I lost the game and now it’s all over. Then, in response to that I felt another part of me stepping in to say “wait a minute, I did a lot of really good work here, not doing it for a day doesn’t make it any less good!”

T-shirts drying in the window, painted over an old painting with some fiery colours

I knew I will continue to draw, the question was, do I start the countdown from scratch or continue. By now you can guess what I decided.

It feels silly to look back at it now, after all there are much bigger sets of rules in the world that are still all completely made up. But in the moment it felt like a big deal. Because that’s what the brain does, it makes things up and then blows them up and up and up. It fills that “thought balloon” with air to the full, until there is pressure and fear. It’s ok brain, put the balloon away, and back down here.

View of London Bridge from the Roasting Plant cafe, drawn over a pre-painted page

Since then, I’ve been drawing daily and when I couldn’t do it I made sure to get back on track as soon as I could. Turns out I missed 28 days. That is a holiday allowance in many full time jobs. Which fits perfectly. I made drawing my daily task, and life forced me to take the statutory holiday entitlement. That doesn’t make me quite the job, it allows me to go on.

A set of objects on my dining table last night

And so I go on. This year’s 3 Materials Challenge started in the beginning of this month and I jumped on board. I plan to stick to it through travelling, moving time zones and countries. It will be fun.

As always, thanks for reading.

x

1. The challenge was organised by

Naomi Tipping

,

Charlotte Durance

and Kathryn Boyt and it’s running again this year. Jump on board! We’re drawing with no more than 3 art materials, from life, for no longer than 30 minutes. You can find the challenge on Instagram using #3materialsdrawingchallenge.