Primrose Art Journal Spread

At the time of sketching up this spread there were dozens of wild primroses peeking their heads out of the grass in our garden. They’re one of my favourite flowers, not just because they are one of the first flowers to bloom in spring, but mainly because it reminds me of walking around my grandparent’s farm in Cornwall, where these flowers thrive! They feel very nostalgic!

I paired the primrose sketch with an illustration of some roses and a reminder for when I’m being too hard on myself for not getting through my overly ambitious to-do list. I don’t use text in my work often but it is interesting to work with and I may incorporate more in future work too!

Portrait Practice & Dying Flowers

It’s been a very long time since I’ve drawn portraits, I’ve always found them to be the most difficult, but I thought it was worth experimenting with. I drew this lady (@eve.frsr) after stumbling across her photo on Instagram, and I just thought that she had a very drawable face. The reason I suddenly started a portrait was that I wanted to practice one as part of a “new year art reset”, a self imposed set of mini art challenges so I can reassess what I enjoy creating and then use those findings to course correct my art direction if necessary. I’ve found them useful in the past!

Drawing this portrait was fun but I’m not sure if it’s something I will do a lot from now on. I get more inspired when drawing things relating to the natural world, however, I do still want to try some life drawing with some photo sets from Drawing Life Studio, as recommended by Emma Carlisle. I’ll be sure to show you all how that turns out!

I also drew this little still life of some dying flowers that were sat in my kitchen. I sometimes think that dead flowers can almost look prettier than live ones, they’re certainly interesting to draw at least!

I really like how gestural I was able to draw some of the flowers, and I think the juxtaposition between the non-shaded leaves and the busy flowers is quite aesthetically pleasing.

Foxglove, Scissors, & Collage

Here’s a scribbly sketch of some Foxglove and a pair of scissors. I really love Procreate’s pencil brushes, particularly the HB and 6B ones, their ability to create such realistic graphite textures are unmatched! I quite like the visual pairing of a botanical with a pair of scissors, though due to Foxglove’s poisonous nature I’ll just say please don’t touch them unless you know how to protect yourself.

I’ve also been enjoying looking at other artist’s collages so this inspired me to create this little abstract composition. They can be a nice way to record colour or texture combinations I like for future reference.