The sketchbook habit

The sketchbook has had something of a renaissance over the past 20 years or so. This is due in part to organisations such as Urban Sketchers, but also due to the internet and the ease in showing sketchbook work online. Artists have always kept sketchbooks, but these were invariably private and not shown outside of the studio.

Sketchbook contents

The sketchbook in its truest sense was and is a receptacle that contains notes and ideas, usually intended as an for work in the studio. It should be remembered that until the advent of photography the sketchbook, if the artist, was the only means of bringing all this information together if not relying on memory alone. But today sketchbooks are often seen as an art form in themselves, with many artists spending as much time and effort on them as the traditional finished painting. These artists have become sketchbook artists who, paradoxically, eschew the photographic record for one that is hand-done. The word ‘sketch’ in this context is something of an oxymoron.