On Labor Day I went to the renaissance faire for the first time in my life. I walked into Under the Mango Tree and, in spite of all the evidence I've collected that the sketchbook itself, no matter how awesome, does NOT in fact make me want to sketch, I purchased an obnoxiously expensive little (like maybe 4") journal with cotton paper in it. The rationale was it could probably take watercolor, and maybe the thumbnail size of it would be less intimidating. So not only was I ignoring all former evidence, I was also assuming that this little book was not only going to make me draw stuff in it, but also GO BACK to it later and hit it with watercolor. What was I thinking? Of course it's been sitting empty in my bedroom since Labor Day.
Last weekend I went up to visit Rochester. While I was walking from my car back to my boyfriend's apartment, I had a Moment (Moment, with a capital M, is the term I use to define a stupid ordinary occurrence that for some reason sparks an emotion followed by a long rambling train of thought in my head. I have lots of them). It was twilight and the sky was blue and lavender and everything against it was almost black, and right as I was approaching this rickety old telephone pole I happened to look up just as a flock of crows flew by the open space between the top of the pole and some bare trees. It was cool. And I stood there for a second just kind of thinking about how cool it was and trying to burn it in my memory. And I thought about how I wished I had a photo of it, except a photo totally would have made it look cheesy. Then I realized what I really wished was that I had my sketchbook and a pocket set of watercolors so I could paint it quickly.
That was the beginning of my long train of thought. At the end of it I realized that I've had this really twisted backward outlook on keeping a sketchbook. It sounds weird, even to me, but I never thought of it as a means to capture these little moments in the world, like a more permanent version of a mental snapshot. And that's like a huge DUH. I think if you asked any random person on the street, artist or not, to define sketching, that would more or less be the gist of their definition. I think I always tried to capture the sketchbook page rather than whatever it was I was sketching. I've seen so many wonderful sketchbooks, and I've just wanted so badly to HAVE one of them, that I've been obsessed with the end and completely ignored the means. Of course, my lack of means has produced me no end, which I suppose is why I keep giving up.
Yesterday my eyes needed a few minutes' break from Flash, and this new thought, which has been sort of nagging me for the past few days, actually made me want to sketch. I'd say it was the first time, except I think the same thing happened when I went to go draw that barn in the woods a couple of months ago; I just hadn't realized it yet. I went to my bedroom window and just drew the light in my backyard:
So, as it turns out, the paper in this lovely little journal I bought does not AT ALL take watercolor. Now I don't know what I'm going to do with it. I really like the size...
Then, returning to my old friend smelly Italian sketchbook, I did something I NEVER do: I tried to sketch the crow scene from memory. Drawing from memory, just barely squeaking by caricature, is my biggest artistic weakness. I'm upset I can't do the scene justice, but nonetheless I felt it ought to be in my sketchbook. I had a little help from a different telephone pole...
That sketchbook doesn't take watercolor much better. It just kind of sits on the surface and doesn't get dark. Maybe I need a watercolor sketchbook.
