I Found My Old Sketchbooks

A look back at old art

Jul 02, 2024

Thank you to everyone who reads Master of Some! I am back from a hiatus. I want to pivot to a direction of more gallery-style posts that show my work.

There is something surreal about rediscovering your old work. I recently found a suitcase in the house that I hadn’t opened for a long time and in it were old sketchbooks from back in university; and several spiral-bound blank journals meant for practice and expression.

I love that I “lost” them for a while because finding them felt like finding a time capsule. I consider myself a late-bloomer when it comes to visual art. The books are from 2019-2021—the specific period when I decided I would pursue art as a serious thing. Today, I want to take you through these books in an attempt to be inspired by my past self. Take your time as you look through the drawings

This is a newsletter about inspiration

Learning to Draw

Back in 2019, I was trying to make the switch into the Art and Visual Technology program. The main issue is that I had no formal experience with visual art at all. Around that time, a friend got me a sketchbook. The drawings in that book were in preparation for my formal art study.

I must note that I wasn’t starting completely from scratch as I had gotten into digital illustration prior. I just wasn’t at the School of Art level.

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A pivotal time for me in art was during the Spring of 2020 (entering ‘unprecedented times'). I was enrolled in Drawing 1. Prof’s emphasis when it came to the sketchbook for that course was Quantity over Quality. You get better at drawing by drawing. We had technical lessons, but always encouraged doodling as a serious practice.

Keeping a visual journal

I think everyone should have a sketchbook. There is something about not having the boundaries set by lines, grids or dots that allows for more freedom in documenting ideas. These ideas can be documented in more formats than words. In my exploration of these sketchbooks from a few years back, I found that each page, section or book represents where I was at the time.

Astral Mountains, Ink and Graphite (2020)

The sketchbooks remind me of what I was learning at the time—in and out of technique. They are stories in themselves. Around the time of drawing the Center for the Arts, I discovered a love of ink. Besides line being my strongest visual element, ink was suitable because of the sharp contrast it has with a blank page.

The Evolution of Style

A lot of the time spent in my sketchbooks during the pandemic were explorations of stylistic possibilities. Combining my study of human anatomy with my love for cartooning, I came about a style that stuck around for years after.

The sketchbooks also hold my artistic influences. The people IRL and online that impacted my style. I’ve written a fair bit about them in my last article and others before but rediscovered more as I looked through the books.

Exploring Storytelling

I have always been more biased towards the sensory. This means I prioritize vibes over plot in a lot of my work. There was a specific sketchbook in which I wrote pages of narrative in an attempt at worldbuilding—hoping to improve as a storyteller. It started with a sketch of a robot.

I think my old ideas can inform the new ones.

“I made this?!”

These days, I have been so far removed from in-depth drawing with ink and paper. Looking back at the work, I was captivated by it. The level of care, the creativity with adding details and the freedom to make.