Sketchbook 40: Bar Napkins, Body Studies, and the Practice of Not Overthinking

When your art practice spans from watercolor emotions to beer-fueled gesture drawings

I've been thinking about how different contexts pull different things out of your pencil. Not in some profound artistic-journey way, just observing how the same hand that renders intimate emotional watercolors on a Tuesday also shows up to a bar on Thursday with a Micron and zero expectations.

The Intimate Stuff

Those first few pieces - the embrace, the figure curled into their phone screen - those came from the part of my practice that's basically visual journaling. Watercolor and ink on cold-press paper, working through proximity and loneliness and the weird geometry bodies make when they're trying to comfort themselves or each other. The simplified yellow/orange/brown palette wasn't an aesthetic choice; it's just what was on my palette that week.

There's something about rendering limbs as these elongated, slightly abstracted forms that feels more honest than photorealism would. Bodies don't feel precise when you're feeling them from the inside.

The VI Series

Then there's the more experimental stuff - that "VI" piece where figures are stacked and interlocking. This is where I stop thinking about emotion and start thinking purely about composition and negative space. Three views of similar poses, seeing how bodies can become architecture. Added the cat because... honestly, I don't remember why. Probably there was a cat nearby when I was drawing.

Bar Sketching with Andrew and Jesse

My favorite sketch group happens at the bar. Beer and drawing. That's Andrew on the right, Jesse on the left - I don't actually know the woman in the center, she was just there and had good lighting. These are fast, loose, done with whatever pen I grabbed. The goal isn't to make portfolio pieces; the goal is to keep your hand moving and maybe catch something true about how someone holds their beer or hunches over their laptop.

This is probably the most important part of my practice, even though it produces the least "serious" work. No pressure, no client, no concept - just observation and cheap beer.

Basic Inquiries Live Figure Drawing

And then there's the structured practice - Basic Inquiries sessions where we actually set up proper lighting and timed poses. This is where technique gets sharpened. Quick gesture sketches in watercolor and ink, trying to capture weight distribution in 2-5 minute poses.

The multiple figure studies you see here - bodies on chairs, kneeling, in various states of casual rest - those are about building visual vocabulary. How does a spine curve? Where does weight settle? What line quality captures muscle tension versus relaxation?

Not romantic. Not conceptual. Just the work of learning to see and translate what you see.

Why All Three Matter

I used to think you needed to pick a lane - be the emotional watercolor artist OR the technical figure drawer OR the casual sketch journalist. But turns out your practice can hold all of it. The intimate emotional work makes the bar sketches more observant. The bar sketches make you faster and less precious. The figure drawing sessions give you the technical foundation to execute whatever weird idea shows up in your watercolor journal.

It's all just drawing. Some of it makes you feel things, some of it makes you better at drawing, some of it just makes the evening more interesting.