I dusted off one of my art journals last week, and tried something different – gestural drawings and paintings. I felt a little awkward doing these at first, but the more I kept at it, the more comfortable I got. Turned out to be a pretty fun exercise, which I’ll definitely keep practicing. 

I used acrylics, watercolors, brushes, and a little collage paper on these pages. I think I put a little too much detail in the faces for this kind of exercise, but I still like how it came out. 

I got the idea from Robert Joyner. I’ve followed his work for years, have taken a couple of his online classes, and absolutely adore his style of painting. He has a Youtube video on gestural drawing and painting, which is pretty cool. I’m one of those artists he talks about in the video who gets pretty bored with my work at times, especially in the past year or so. I’ve been doing this so long, I feel like I’ve done it all already, at least a million times, in fact. Which of course, I haven’t, but my mind tends to exaggerate things sometimes, and I get stuck. Watching Robert’s video helped me. You should check it out, and give gestural drawing a try. 

Oh, how I’ve missed playing in my art journals. It’s been about a month since I’ve cracked one open. I want to bring back the weekly art journal blog posts again, so look for more posts like these each Tuesday. 

PS: If you want to use reference photos for your drawings, check out Unsplash. All photos are copyright free..not that anyone would guess I used reference photos for these drawings, but still..if you’re concerned, you don’t have to worry if you use these photos. Look under the Fashion category.