Artistic Pursuits

I have started sketching (sort of) again.

It started about three years ago just after my college placements…

After getting a job offer, I felt so relaxed that I started thinking about picking up my favourite, old hobby: painting. I overestimated myself and thought that I was ready to try oil paintings (after a gap of almost 10 years!) I bought Daler-Rowney’s oil colour tubes along with other things such as linseed oil, a set of big brushes, canvas etc from a local stationery shop. I was very excited to try oil paintings having watched so many video tutorials. But, the winter of 2014 turned out to be a failure. Oil painting requires much effort, practise, and understanding of the medium for which I wasn’t ready at all. So, the colour set and other supplies are stored in my cupboard for now…

Later when I started the internship, I was still motivated to not give up my artistic attempts, so I decided to get back to basics: sketching. Instead of wasting my time (actually, I watched many Hayao Miyazaki’s movies so it wasn’t really a waste of time…oh well). I decided to buy some graphite pencils and a sketchbook. I hardly used to get time on weekdays due to work but weekends were entirely free. So, I used to sketch. I spent many hours pouring over sketches on Pinterest to find something I could start with and I found some great tutorials too. I sketched butterflies, countrysides and random objects for practise. It worked for me and kept me happily busy for many hours in those days. I kept practising on and off until the end of 2015. Year-end, I decided to dip my hands in colours, figuratively. Even though my sketches were far from perfect (what is perfect art, anyway?) I wanted to start colouring. Colours are fun, after all! I bought Camlin Premium Colour Pencils even if I had my eyes on expensive Derwent or Prisma Colors, but they could wait, I needed to practise first.

Sadly, I didn’t get much time to use them because the workplace sucked up most of my time and energy. And, the pencils lay forgotten in my luggage…

Until I fished them out this month! Yes, I still have had them, I am very particular about the things I own and take care of them.

You would ask,”Why to take them out all of a sudden?”. After all this dormant phase, the existence of adult colouring books finally hit my consciousness this month, and I felt there couldn’t be a better way to get involved in artistic pursuits than this, at least for now.

I bought Daria Song’s The Night Voyage to begin with. I also fulfilled my wish by buying Derwent Inktense Water Colour Pencils tin of 24 and it’s absolutely lovely! I will review it (not that it needs my review, everybody loves it!) and share what I love about it.

I hope I stick to colouring books for now and start sketching again, and hopefully do what I dream of doing eventually: my own oil paintings.

Let’s embark on the journey!