Ritual and Response: Sketchbook Workshop
Welcome to this free sketchbook session with Helen Wells. In it we will explore an approach to working in a sketchbook which includes both ritual and response.
A creative practice that supports:
Ongoing use of our abandoned art experiments to inspire something new and interesting. Allowing our sketchbook to build one small action at time with no grand plan. (Ritual)
Permission to respond intuitively to materials, fragments, and our own visual instinct. (Response)
In this session we will use our sketchbook as a practice of returning, experimenting, and unearthing your own visual language.
Watch the video below:
In this process we are getting rid of that blank page and getting rid of the idea that we have to have an idea before we sit down to create.
What this session is about
This class introduces a sketchbook technique, but it’s not about doing it the right way. It’s a spacious approach to creativity that invites you to return, explore and notice what unfolds.
You’ll use collage, layering, and response as a repeatable rhythm, a low-pressure way to stay connected to your art, without waiting for a big idea or a perfect plan.
It’s part ritual, part refuge and fully yours to make your own.
You don’t need to finish a page before working on another. Just begin and freely roam around your sketchbook. Consider this a free-range approach to sketchbooks.
This sketchbook practice is a way and place to notice, respond, and reconnect.
Over time, the pages will start to become rich with your art and magic.
What we’ll be doing…
Starting with fragments
Begin with scraps, offcuts, unfinished pieces. No planning required.
These fragments are creative compost. They hold more potential than you think.
Responding with materials
Layer over your pages with whatever you fancy, it could be pencil, pastel, ink, marker pen. If using marker pan avoid alcohol based pens which may bleed through.
Let rhythm and repetition lead you. This is where your visual language starts to surface.
Returning over time
Come back later. Add. Layer. Shift. Let the pages evolve without pressure.
This process grows and evolves as you respond to what is already on the page. Surprises may surface and ideas may appear often unexpectedly.
Your sketchbook does not have to be linear, it can be built through ritual and response, not sequence.
Some thoughts on materials…
Sketchbooks
Here are some of the sketchbooks I like, but sketchbooks are a personal preference and come in so many different shapes, sizes and varieties, the sketchbook that is right for me, may not be right for you.
The best sketchbook to use is always the one you already own. If you want to use a lot of mixed media you’ll want to look out for a sketchbook that can take wet materials
Art supplies
This way of working lends it’s self to using lots of different art supplies. One day you can add some marks with a pencil, one day add a little watercolour. It’s a good opportunity to explore how your art supplies interact on the page. We can return using different media, until we have a page which looks interesting and varied. This is not a prescriptive session where you have to use a specific type of art supply Use any art supplies you have access to and fancy using. `Here are some of the ones I use;
Glue stick, I use a variety, my go to glue stick is one from Tombow
Watercolour paint, I have a fancy set from Sennelier but I also like Kuretake
Coloured pencils from Faber Castell
(Some of these links are affiliate links, if you buy something through them, I might earn a small commission, at no extra cost to you. I only ever share the products that I actually use.)
This is a free-range approach to filling a sketchbook, piece by piece we roam freely across our whole sketchbook with no need to finish a page before we more on to the next one…
