For this exercise I was tasked with creating temporary drawings using every day things and nature. The idea is to get used to the idea of drawing as something fleeting, expressive and playful. I didn’t have all the things available to me in the suggested ideas but I brainstormed my own ideas and came up with the below!
I first went to the beach and collected some stones and sticks and did some little drawings in the sand while taking quick photos before the waves hit – very temporary indeed – by the time I had started another drawing, the other one was gone! I went for relevant watery simple images!
I then went to the park and picked some daisies and other tiny grass flowers and leaves from trees to make some the below flower scenes. I’m sure the wind has blown them away by now!
I then used the stones and some berries, leaves and flowers to make a circular pattern and then realised that the leaves looked a little like animal footprints so made a set of ‘footprints’ walking away!
I then just used the stones directly and made a little heart shape!
I found a secluded part of the park where the ground was wet and with less stones and no grass and then took a stick to create a swirl that somehow turned into a snail!
As I was walking home I spotted some puddles and played around with splashing in them with my feet and taking quick shots of the effect on the water, this only lasted seconds so probably the most temporary or fleeting art I have ever done 🙂
I got home and was looking at things i had in the house and decided to feed the birds, with an artistic flair! So I line up some different coloured seeds and grains on my windowsill (no garden) and the birds had a ball!
I was also trying to think of materials that are temporary and decided to make watercolour ice cubes for a colourful rainbow collage of cubes as per the below.
I bought some chalks to do some chalk drawings outside though I felt a little bit silly going out to do this and was probably a bit too worried about getting checked so I used an old chopping board to do some chalk drawing, which gave quite a surprising texture and feel:
This exercise was actually a lot of fun. It was really spontaneous and I found myself doing things without thinking too much or worrying too much about the final result – which is actually a very hard thing for me to do. Loosening up my drawing and planning was something I had to really concentrate on doing in my previous illustration course. It is also very different from responding to a brief and lots of instruction which I find actually influences the way I think about achieving the final result in advance of exploring options, which is of course not the best for coming up with ideas.
The results themselves are also rather fun and surprising – though I certainly would not call them masterpieces 🙂 However, I do fine them playful and charming and I did try to develop something I found aesthetically pleasing and even cropped the images to be more centred in Photoshop. Though the aesthetics are quite subjective of course!
What I take from this is that, by thinking of mark making beyond pencil and paper, such experimentation and spontaneity can really get the creative juices going and take you to final images and places you couldn’t imagine yourself directly without going through such a process. Being outside and walking around and actively looking for inspiration and ideas is also really useful and much more engaging that internet research – though at times we have to depend on that and particularly more now in COVID-19 times.
I hope I can use this way of thinking and experimentation in my permanent work more to get more pleasant surprises from my practice, work with more media and mixed media, and perhaps continue to loosen my drawing practice so I can really develop my own style.
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