Launching a newsletter, rest, and playing with art supplies

No. 01 | August Newsletter

Hi Friends,

Thank you for subscribing to my mailing list!

I was initially going to set up my newsletter through my website provider, but I’ve been inspired by many others to launch it through Substack, which has been a delightful process.

Personally, I’ve been enjoying the slow pace of blogs and newsletters lately in contrast to the hyperconsumption of social media. I’ve been working on making this place cozy for you, and I’m sure it will evolve along the way as I find my footing.

What I’ve been up to

Picture book work

I’ve been busy working on illustrating a series of small picture books with a publisher and I finished the final art for the first book in June. Just wrapped up the sketches for the second book, and am now leaping into sketches for the third and final book.

While I can’t share much about these yet, it has been great to be working on picture books this year after illustrating my very first picture book last year. It feels like what I’m meant to be doing. I’m excited to keep pursuing a career in picture books, see where it takes me, and share my journey along the way.

Resting and playing with art supplies

After an intense period of creative work, especially commercial work, creative blocks are not uncommon. It is usually an indication that your creative well has been depleted, therefore you must take time to replenish it. To me, this is a natural part of the creative cycle, and I find that rest and play are usually the best medicine.

Recently, I’ve been feeling particularly reinvigorated after having been able to take a break in between my deadlines to rest (do nothing!) and also play with art supplies without any aim other than to have fun experimenting.

I picked up some oil pastels after watching Pearfleur’s Youtube video and I never thought I would enjoy them as much as I did. The last time I used oil pastels was in high school, and I don’t remember being too fond of them. While oil pastel isn’t going to become my primary medium anytime soon, it felt refreshing to try something new outside of my comfort zone and play.

I’ve been having fun incorporating them into my mixed media process: layering them over watercolour washes, blending with cotton swabs, and adding coloured pencils on top. I have been pleasantly surprised by how well these can work together. It ultimately got me thinking about my work in new ways and made me excited to create personal art again.

In a similar vein, I was doing a bit of a declutter in my studio and discovered an old set of Prismacolor Scholar coloured pencils, which included a few bright neon hues. I’ve since experimented with layering these under watercolour and have fallen in love with the textures and effects it creates when the colour shows through, especially on rough cold press watercolour paper. Magic!

I’m reminded that incorporating play into my art practice can lead to unexpected breakthroughs in my process and help me move through creative blocks.

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New in the shop

This year I opened an INPRNT shop, a print-on-demand service, in order to be able to offer prints without the stress of running a shop on my own while I focus on client work, developing my picture book portfolio, and creating resources. I chose to go with them because they offer gallery-quality giclée art prints on 100% cotton rag archival paper, printed with archival inks, and give artists a fair cut of the profit (50% of the sale price).

If you see anything you’d love to hang on your wall or give as a gift, this is a great way to support me.

Between August 3rd and 5th, I’m offering a 15% discount with this coupon code: S0SJGSCJ

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Things I’ve been enjoying lately

• Sophie McPike’s chatty art videos on Youtube

• My current chill studio playlist on Spotify featuring many of my favourite indie folk and alternative music (if you’re into that!)

• Darning holes in old socks with visible mending techniques and giving them a new life by following tutorials from Bookhou

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I’m looking forward to sharing and staying in touch with you in this space away from social media algorithms. Please do let me know if there’s anything you’d particularly like to see from me, I’d love to hear from you.

Thanks for reading!

Take care,
– Danielle