Wrestling With The Inner Critic

I am pleased to say that I won today's bout with the inner critic or maybe it was a draw. Given the entire experience, I can at least be proud that I didn't lose. Today, I took my brave pill and went to my first Urban Sketcher's event in the Twin Cities. It was at the Cycling Museum of Minnesota.  My skill level is at rudimentary place from all of the participants, based upon the work I saw at the end of the event. That mostly does not matter. I try very hard to compare my work to my work, since none of this comes easily and I haven't been doing it very long.

I started with a rough sketch of a penny-farthing and a partial sketch of an early tricycle for a child. The tricycle may not look like much, because I don't get how to make the different parts distinct enough. Still, I felt pretty good about this and I think practicing drawing chairs helped. 

At best, I was feeling okay. It's hard to be surrounded by a lot of people who were doing beautiful work in their sketchbooks. It makes it easy for doubt to creep in. Plus, the number of objects to choose from was overwhelming. I had a hard time getting focus and figuring out what I wanted to accomplish. I was erasing a lot and that got even worse when I wanted to figure out how to draw the following seat. 

Bicycle seat of doom

I tried to follow the front edge and the back edge, but couldn't figure out how the back line underneath the seat attached the two. I drew and erased and drew and erased again and again and again. It got the voice in my head to a very negative and bad place and I felt awful. After making myself miserable, I decided that working in pencil was the wrong choice and that I needed to let go of the stupid bicycle seat. The picture is so that I can print it out and trace it, when I'm not so mad at it. 

Rather than quit, I made two decisions.  The first was to work in pen and just own the lines that I was drawing. The second was to move onto drawing different handlebars from different angles.While doing this, I remember thinking I'm not them, I'm me, and I need to do what's right for me at this moment. I felt better. There's no picture, since these pages were very messy, After than, I went back to pencil, picked some random bike parts like a back tire and fender, and finished up with a tall unicycle hanging from a beam.

At the end of the session, people were invited to put their sketchbook on the floor so that we could see everyone's work. This was a bit tough. I'm not even close to having the skill to compose and create something pretty or artistic. The best that I can do is represent what I see and many times I don't even get to that point. I expect to struggle with this even as a gain skills, given that I like fussy details and I like accuracy. Sigh. 

Still I am proud that I showed up, I sketched, I worked myself out of a very bad place, and I put my sketchbook down along with the rest.   

Overall, the group seemed friendly and welcoming, although there was zero conversation after people started sketching. I spoke to several people. If my schedule allows, I will try and go again.