This feels like a huge leap into something that's still so unknown and unfamiliar.
Those who got my newsletter last week got the announcement that I will be compiling a sketchbook of responses to the many events of 2020. My dear friend Aspen sent me a sketchbook for The Sketchbook Project from the Brooklyn Art Library and I think it's a perfect opportunity. Not only can I catalog emotions, events, lessons, and growth from the year 2020 in it, I can do it without the pressure of perfection I regularly put on myself. It's a really cheap, simple sketchbook where I can create finished pieces from the scribbles on it's pages, or let it lie as an expression of 2020.
For my patrons here, you'll get to see detailed pictures of my progress and hopefully receive a physical copy of the sketchbook if I end up making it that far. It will be a simple staple binding of 5x7" printer paper photos, the same size as the original. If I gather more patrons and supporters for the project, I can invest more time and money and have the copies printed through a self publishing company on better paper with higher quality photos.
My Covid-19 paintings are steadily developing as I work on them each week. In my mind it doesn't look like a lot of work is getting done and I wish I could spend more hours in my studio painting them. I work my day job Wednesday through Saturday and take at least one day to take care of myself, leaving one or two days a week to paint.
With this sketchbook project, I hope to develop more ideas about the pandemic, the election, and the continuing environmental crisis while I'm stuck at work. I foresee a mess of unfinished work crowding my studio as I get more and more excited about new projects and struggle to finish old ones. The benefit of this being that I will always have something interesting to work on and the more I create, the more finished pieces I can develop to completion.
So please join this journey into my interpretations of the year 2020, what it brought, and what it taught.