Bizarre creature – sketch from the subconscious
Ink sketch on paper 9x7cm. Digital colouring. April 2017
A small drawing from the imagination that is in one of my sketchbooks.
I sometimes sit down with a sketchbook when I have a few minutes to spare and just draw whatever comes into my head, unmediated. It’s a sort of subconscious, automatic drawing. I used to think that such sketches would be a good way to encourage the development of new concepts and motifs without too much conscious thought channelling my work down well trodden pathways. However, I soon found that it was actually a way of revealing to oneself one’s inner obsessive visions, as variations on the same themes inevitably lay themselves out on the page time after time. This particular sketch, I see from the notes beside it, was drawn in the gardens of Hatfield House, a stately home in Hertfordshire, while sitting next to the very fine wisteria that’s growing there. There seems to be no link between the two.
The colour in the image was added later, after scanning the sketch into my laptop.