Sketch!: The Non-Artist's Guide to Inspiration, Technique, and Drawing Daily Life Paperback – November 4, 2014

The media could not be loaded. I was quite excited when I knew that France Belleville-Van Stone was coming up with a book. I follow her blog where she posts her drawings from daily life, be it sketches from the living room, backs of her colleagues during a meeting, cars, shoes, or her cat Peaches. I like the style of her pen and ink drawings, and just her art in general.The book Sketch! is a 134-page paperback with rounded corners. The pages are designed to look like textured paper, and her encouraging text and beautiful drawings are printed on them. It's a nice presentation.This book gives us a personal account of her artistic journey and a peek into her creative process. It's one where she shares about her drawing experience, and in finding time to draw. This is more like a book on ideas rather than techniques. The inspiration comes from reading through her personal experiences.She talks about the drawing supplies that she uses, basic techniques in brief, what and where to draw when time is limited, drawing digital on the tablet (she uses iPad), and finally a list of subjects to draw listed alphabetically. If you follow her art blog, this book is like the behind-the-scenes guidebook to what she does, topics I wished were written on her blog but weren't.I find it inspiring that she can find time to draw even when she's a busy mum and French teacher -- I always imagined she teaches art because of all her drawings. She gives helpful tips and suggestions on what you can draw with limited time, on handling expectations and dealing with the excuses that you might give yourself for not drawing enough. As someone who likes to draw, I could relate to many of the issues mentioned.It's a motivating and inspiring book. Recommended to sketchers and artists.(See more pictures of the book on my blog. Just visit my Amazon profile for the link.)

How about this:"The process that you go through, be it for ten minutes or three hours is the drawing. Like a visually impaired person has to feel someone's face with their hands to tell their features, I sit and gradually take in the details of a place or a person through the pen. While taking pictures with an SLR or smartphone is great fun, I feel involved on a much deeper level through the act of drawing. I sometimes walk through or past places I have drawn and am so well acquainted with them that I have the uncanny feeling of having lived there."Or this:"Dismissing drawing well as a gift is a cop-out. I think most of us who can draw a portrait or a tree do so because behind each drawing, there have been hours of prior drawings. I sucked before I could draw anything half-decenty, and unfortunately for me, sucking at drawing is not over. I still fail. I still draw painstakingly."Add in quirky, warm sketches (she had me on the second sketch of Keith Richards), an A-Z of prompts to get drawing, suggestions for pens, pencils, paper and iPhone apps, and what you have is a brilliant, inspirational, accessible guide to sketching that focusses on the why more than the how, but that's as it should be. The how is for every person to work out for themselves. But you could do no better than start here.

I've read a lot about sketching, and this book was similar to all I have read. Nice format and style, but not for an experienced sketcher.

I learned a lot about all things sketching! I learned about the various ways to sketch, the best supplies to use, time management, and what to draw...when you are feeling uninspired to draw. This is a book to keep close-by because the reader can always pick it up at a later time, if you need a quick inspiration tool to get you drawing again.

Just received this book and I love it! I've been drawing and painting for 30+ years and yes, I already know a lot of the content but the author has a wonderful way with words, she makes the topic fun and enjoyable, no dry academic slog here. Also lots of information on up-to-date current supplies, like water brushes and the best available sketchbooks for every type of drawing. I'm looking forward to the chapter on computer/tablet apps and best digital drawing apps. Even though drawing and sketching is an old subject this book brings it to life in today's world. Her drawings/illustrations are wonderful and inspirational too. I highy recommend this book for artists of every level.

If you're ever in a creative rut, pick up this book. It will inspire you! France Belleville-Van Stone has a natural artistic talent and I'm sure most people wish they had her mad sketching skills (I do!), but she wrote this book for the untrained artists, like me, that draw because it is just something we HAVE to do. Sometimes life gets in the way of things we love. The suggestions that France share are meant to inspire us to change our expectations of completing a finished drawing and bust through that creative block. She gives us tools to expand our horizons by trying new media, change things up with 10-minute drawings, and other great suggestions. The A-Z prompts she provides in Chapter 6 are meant to inspire us to take those few minutes in our rushed world and put pencil to paper and draw for the sheer love of it!France's drawings are incredible! This book makes a great gift for the aspiring artist!

Very helpful to me to be reminded that drawing is way more about drawing than the end result and to be guided and celebrated in practicing the sketchbook habitthank you FB Van Stone. :)