How I failed at posting daily for Peachtober but made progress on my art goals.
This month I figured out my priorities and what specifically I’ll be prioritising and by that I mean, I had to remember myself and focus.
In theory I took part in Peachtober with the intention of getting myself back into the habit of drawing consistently. For the past year or so I have been struggling to figure out my goals, art process and practice, so much so I even created a course to help me develop my creative practice, but we’ll get into that later. For October I decided I wanted to participate in an Instagram art challenge, and Peachtober felt like the right fit. However, by the time a week was done, I realised how difficult it was for me to produce artwork quickly. I figure I need at least the whole day to get my ideas, words and sketches down, a few days to a week for the painting before the final touches, which is really a week and a half at the very minimum.
In the past I would have a finished piece of art, but it always felt lacking, not to mention if I have other projects, work and tasks to complete, then the process takes much longer. This is something that isnt really talked about online, or at least when artists do talk about it, it’s not taken seriously and with the way social media has us devouring art like fiends, artists are burning out trying to keep up with the demand. So I stopped and asked the question {again} what do I want to do?
No more side quests! - I need more time to create my artwork. I also need a purpose and direction that is my own.
The Peachtober challenge helped me develop my ideas, and storytelling skills while working on my art process. Figuring out exactly what type of artwork I want to create, what type of Illustrator and artist I want to be, and what Industry I’d like to work in. I think publishing, working on chapter books, graphic novels, and book covers would be interesting. I also still want to work on young adult books, whether that be writing or just book covers. This means I need to think about creating these pieces for my portfolio. And the best way for me to do that, is to work on my project again.
Peachtober this year was a bust, but taking part in the challenge helped me work on my illustration process, decide where I might like to work within the industry and more importantly renewed my passion for my graphic novel project. If you would like to check out the completed images from the challenge, click here.
If you read to the end, thanks for sticking with me. My next post will be on getting ready for a pop up on November the 17th, then we’ll get into the project, it’s time.
Stay safe and stay creative x
