I’ve just finished my four weeks of “full-time” rehabilitation – effective but exhausting 😅️. Still, I’ve mustered my strength to send you some beautiful images and give you a peek behind the scenes of the creative process!
Art in January + February: different types of sketches
These few pages out of my sketchbooks show some examples of the many uses you can make of a sketchbook :)
- A drawing from memory (the clover flower on the top left). I had randomly picked the theme ‘clover’ from my list of prompts for days when I have no ideas. And as it was a day without ideas, I interpreted it quite literally; that still allowed me to let my thoughts escape my hospital bed for a little while 😌️
- Ideation sketches, some of which may eventually become illustrations (everything else on that page, and the next). I followed the method described my Alfredo Cáceres (also known as redolaf) in his course on the Domestika platform: start with an element (here the goat 😁️), and draw, in a rather schematic way, whatever comes to mind… I was not convinced (“so what if nothing comes to mind?”) but eventually it worked quite well, especially when combining with a limited number of other elements (night / moon / stars, reflections, trees), playing with position (what’s in front/behind, above/below) and relative sizes, and (this one’s not from Alfredo, I used it intuitively and am noticing while writing this 🤓️) repetition/multiplication ✨️
- A drawing from imagination (left). This time the theme was ‘familiar’ (in the sense of an animal-companion of a witch 😊️). I drew a blank at first and thought I’d just do a random girl (whose hairstyle got influenced by animated film ‘Cosmic Princess Kaguya!’ which I was watching at the time 😁️). Then I had the idea that a small animal could sit in her hair; first thought of a squirrel, then decided on a mouse 🐭
- A drawing from life (nowadays you’d call that ‘urban sketching’ to sound cooler 😁️) (right). You can make out the reference in the background (it’s a building at the clinic where I did my rehabilitation 😅️). I’m not so used to drawing buildings, but I got inspired by that looong roof 😊️ (which I could have exaggerated even more to make the point, actually!)
From my camera roll: winter light
This winter we had quite a lot of snow – during a walk (before my accident…) I marvelled at the changing winter sky, the clouds, the magical light of the late afternoon…
Inspiration: sashiko!
Embroidery, sewing, clothing customisation and repair, Japan, repeating patterns… Sashiko simply seems made for me (or maybe I’m made for sashiko 😁️)!
If you’d like to know more, the Wikipedia article is a good introduction; this article and this one focus on different aspects of the sashiko practice, history and contemporary uses.
I also recommend the Upcycle Stitches website. It presents sashiko from the point of view (which I find interesting) of sashiko embroiderer and entrepreneur Atsushi Futatsuya (note that some articles – including this comprehensive introduction – seem to have been hacked/pirated and include advertising links to unrelated products, quite cleverly woven into the text but rather obviously foreign, I think… Don’t let that deter you from the actual, honest and generous content 😌️).
Finally, on YouTube I quite like the XiaoXiao Yarn channel, whose videos are both esthetically pleasing and clearly explain the technique 😊️.
For now I’m practicing the basics, and my goal is to repair and reinforce damaged clothing; especially some linen trousers that I woud be so pleased to be wearing again rather than having to search for a substitute!
These are some examples of ‘visible mending’, I would like to make something like that! (unfortunately they come from an image search I did without noting down/researching the craftspersons, shame on me 🥲️)
That’s it for this month!
As always, if there’s anything you would like to ask, something you would like to read about in the next letter, or anything really – send me an email at hello@reinekurth.com! It would be lovely to hear from you 😊.
With love,
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