How I stopped creative perfectionism and started filling my sketchbook again.
Getting my hands dirty again
We live in such a digital world these days. Everything is on your phone, your laptop or on tv. You see things on a screen - nothing is tangible anymore.
Don’t get me wrong, I love creating illustrations and art on my tablet using Procreate. But there is something about holding your designs in your hands, touching them, feeling the texture and seeing the colours. Instead of a smooth, glossy screen you’re holding thick paper, feeling the texture from the paint blobs and seeing the little imperfections.
Over the past couple of weeks I’ve been picking up the paint brush more - getting away from the screens and filling my sketchbook again.
Letting go of creative perfectionism
And of course, learning to deal with the mistakes you inevitably make. There’s no undo button, no ctrl+Z, no redrawing a line over and over until it looks perfect. No option to make your lines more steady - they will be wobbly as f*ck.
I was creating this piece and at first I sketched the chicken way too high, so had to erase it and start again. Then I went in with too much yellow - I planned to have a bit more white on its chest - so had to go back over with a clear brush to wipe off some of the yellow paint.
When finishing it, I wanted to add some texture with a different colour and added some purple on its wings. When that dried up, it didn’t look right - too much purple, I wanted it to be subtle. So back in with a clear brush, trying to pull it off and going over the wings again with the pink and orange, then subtly adding the purple.
When it came to the outlines I was nervous - this was the point of no return. Pencil marks you can erase, watercolour paint you can paint over but black fineliner is there to stay. So I tried some of the markers I had and went with a thinner one - thinking I could add the thickness where I wanted to. The lines are wobbly and I did want to keep perfecting them. But I stopped myself and thought No, this is what makes it handmade, real.
Letting go of creative perfectionism is what makes you so much more creative, in ways other than the subject on the paper.
An empty page in an old sketchbook
I was a bit stiff to start with and thoughts like ‘oh no an empty page’ and ‘I really want to make something beautiful’ stopped me in my tracks. But I realised those thoughts were holding me back - so I changed them. I thought: ‘let’s experiment’ ‘let’s go super random’ ‘I never use this colour, what will happen if I do’.
And all of a sudden, this sketchbook I’ve been using for years was full. I found another half-filled one, so kept going with that.
I took pictures, shared them on my Instagram stories, people loved them. But I felt a bit sad that they were just sitting there, in my sketchbook, that I’d close once finished and kinda forgot about these colourful pieces I created. Recently I realised that I want to get more illustration jobs. And that means I have to create more illustrations and actually share them. Showcase my illustration style outside of client branding.
The idea I almost talked myself out of
I was scrolling mindlessly on Instagram and I don’t even know what the post was but it was something to do with sending things in the actual post. Physical letters. And I had this lightbulb moment.
What if I send someone on my email list a piece of art. Nothing big, just something I created that week. As a thank you, as a happy moment. Something lovely to get through your letterbox. Something to hold, touch, smell (weird?) and maybe even put on your wall. Something to put a smile on your face.
But as per usual, I didn’t post about this straight away. I had to sit with it for a minute, and when you sit with ideas for a minute, you start to also come up with all the reasons why you shouldn’t do them. I need a new sign up form, with a field to add an address. But is that even legal, if I’m not going to use their address? How do I even draw their names? Do I create something specific for them? But what if they don’t want my art? What if they don’t want my emails? Ugh, maybe this is too complicated.
It did make me excited to create more physical art though and the more I kept wondering, the more I wanted to put it out there and see what happened. So I did, without having it all figured out.
Sending joy through the letterbox
And here we are. I’ve drawn the lucky email subscriber from a hat, asked for her address and will be creating something for her. Posting it out to hopefully bring a bit of happiness to her this week.
When I contacted her on Instagram - she was so grateful for this and said:
“What a gorgeous message to open on a Friday afternoon! This is Lovely. Thank you! You’ve got me thinking now about how I can pay it forward.”
This made me so happy - knowing that I’ve given someone something that they thought was so special, and that’s what this is all about for me: sharing a bit of joy.
I also commented on Lomond Paper co. post on Instagram, asking if people still write letters and Sarah felt inspired to do something similar. She’ll be sending a letter out every Sunday.
How amazing is that? I did not decide to do this for others to feel they have to do something too. I basically created it so I can share my artwork with more people. Have more of a purpose to create cool things. But for someone to take it and feel inspired to do something lovely for someone else is incredible.
Want in on the joy?
I’ll be sending one piece of art every week to one of the people on my email list. So if you love the chance to receive a beautifully, colourful, handmade piece of art through the post, make sure to sign up to my email list.
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