Drawing with Confidence, Part 9: Keeping a Sketchbook
Transform daily moments into creative sparks
Image by Kelly Sikkema
Drawing with Confidence is a free online art course. Develop your drawing skills through playful exercises and thoughtful experimentation. Overcome barriers to self-expression and embrace the joy of mark making.
Lesson 9 — Key concepts we'll explore:
How regular sketchbook practice accelerates artistic growth
Building a sustainable habit through consistency, not perfection
Using your sketchbook as a private space for experimentation and development of your unique visual journey
Your Sketchbook is a Sanctuary
A sketchbook is a personal sanctuary where you can explore, experiment, and evolve as an artist without judgment or pressure. Unlike finished artwork meant for display, your sketchbook is a private space where the process matters more than the outcome.
Many artists hesitate to maintain a sketchbook because they feel every page must be beautiful or complete. But the true power of a sketchbook lies in its role as a visual diary—capturing not just what you see but how you see it. It documents your unique perspective and artistic journey over time.
Think about how you currently use (or don’t use) a sketchbook. Do you save it for ‘good’ drawings? Do you tear out pages that don’t meet your expectations? Consider how liberating it might feel to have a space where imperfection isn’t just acceptable—it’s valuable.
Create a Habit, Not a Masterpiece
Consistency trumps perfection when it comes to sketchbook practice. A sketchbook with daily five-minute drawings will advance your skills more than occasional marathon sessions. Small, regular marks and scribbles in your personal exploration space compound over time, helping you build your skills and increase your confidence.
Artists like Frida Kahlo, Joan Mitchell, and Leonardo da Vinci kept regular sketchbooks that revealed their thinking processes, not just their finished ideas. These intimate visual journals are windows into the artists’ unique perspectives and experiences of the world around them.
Ask yourself: What small drawing habit could you realistically maintain? Perhaps it’s drawing your morning coffee, sketching fellow commuters, or capturing a single object from your day before bed.
Noticing Your Artistic Growth
Many artists report that their most original ideas and breakthrough moments come not from careful planning but from the unexpected connections that emerge through regular sketchbook practice. Your sketchbook becomes both the soil and the seedbed for your creative growth.
Consider reviewing your sketchbook monthly. What themes repeat? Which techniques are you gravitating toward? What subjects do you avoid? This reflective practice turns your sketchbook into a record of what you’ve drawn and a map of where your artistic journey might go next.
Confidence Boost
Your sketchbook isn’t just bound sheets of paper. It’s a visual autobiography charting your unique artistic path. The most valuable sketchbooks are filled with moments of experimentation, false starts, and unexpected discoveries. Every sketch captures a moment of courage when you chose creation over fear. Each page is proof you’ve been brave enough to grow. The artist with a well-worn sketchbook never has to wonder ‘what if?’. They have tangible evidence of their commitment to becoming. Remember, your journey deserves to be recorded.
Image by Edz Norton
Exercise: The Daily Dozen
In this exercise, you’ll establish a sustainable sketchbook routine by creating a personalised template for regular practice. Rather than facing the intimidation of a blank page each day, you’ll create a structure that makes daily drawing both manageable and meaningful.
Materials
Your sketchbook
Pencil, pen, or your preferred drawing tool
Optional: ruler for creating template sections
Timer
Instructions
Create a template page divided into 12 small sections (approximately 2x2 inches each)
Label each section with a repeatable drawing prompt that resonates with you, such as:
Something I touched today
A shape from nature
An object in my bag/pocket
A pattern I noticed
Something that made me smile
A piece of text or typography
A shadow or light pattern
A quick self-portrait
Something I ate
A hand gesture
An imagined creature
A memory from today
Commit to filling one section each day for 12 days
Set a timer for 5 minutes per section—work quickly and intuitively
Date each drawing and add brief notes if desired
After completing all 12 sections, duplicate the template for your next 12 days
Reflection
Which prompts energised you, and which felt like a chore?
How did time constraints affect your drawing approach?
Did you notice improvement in certain subjects over the 12 days?
Which prompts would you keep, modify, or replace for your next template?
How might you adapt this structure to fit your lifestyle and artistic goals?
Remember: The goal isn’t 12 perfect drawings—it’s establishing a sustainable relationship with your sketchbook that becomes a natural part of your daily life, like brushing your teeth or checking your phone. Through this consistent practice, drawing will become less an event and more a habit—a regular way of processing and engaging with your world.
Art in Focus
Artists’ Sketchbooks Through History
Pages from Frida Kahlo’s Diary. Source
Throughout history, artists’ sketchbooks have provided invaluable insights into their creative processes, serving as visual laboratories where ideas germinate and evolve. These intimate documents reveal the thinking behind masterpieces and offer glimpses into artists’ daily observations and experimentations.
Frida Kahlo’s diary combines drawings, paintings, and writing in a deeply personal visual journal, showing how sketchbooks can serve as emotional processing tools, blending symbolic imagery with colour exploration and personal reflection.
Vincent van Gogh’s letters to his brother Theo often included small sketches documenting his current work or exploring composition ideas, demonstrating how drawing can clarify thought and communicate visual concepts.
Joan Mitchell’s sketchbooks were filled with spontaneous drawings, colour studies, and gestural marks, revealing a more contemplative side of her practice, where she worked through formal problems, recorded observations of nature, and experimented with compositional arrangements.
Henry Moore’s sketchbooks captured sleeping figures in London Underground stations during WWII bombing raids, developing his characteristic abstracted human forms through quick, fluid observations of draped bodies.
Leonardo Da Vinci’s notebooks contain everything from anatomical studies to grocery lists and failed designs, showing even the masters used their sketchbooks as tools for thinking, not just showcases for perfection.
Francisco Goya’s drawings in his private albums revealed his unfiltered social critiques and psychological explorations, containing disturbing scenes of human folly and nightmare visions that were too controversial for public display in his lifetime.
Pablo Picasso’s sketchbooks explored ideas across multiple styles and periods, often containing preliminary studies for major works like Les Demoiselles d’Avignon alongside playful experiments that reveal his constant visual thinking process.
John Constable’s sketchbooks contain meticulous cloud studies and landscape sketches documenting atmospheric conditions with scientific precision, serving as observational records and preparation for his larger oil paintings.
Connection to Your Practice
Consider how the historical examples might inform your sketchbook practice. How might you make your sketchbook more accessible throughout your day? What other creative practices might you bring into conversation with your drawing? How might your sketchbook serve as a tool for clarifying and communicating visual ideas? How might your sketchbook become a tool for more careful observation and attentive engagement with the world around you?
Observation Exercise
Spend 15 minutes studying an artist’s sketchbook pages. Choose from one of the above artists or find another whose work interests you. Many are available online through museum archives or published in books available at the public library. As you examine their pages, consider:
What subjects appear repeatedly in their sketchbook?
How finished or unfinished do most of their sketches appear?
Do they use text alongside images? If so, how?
What materials do they seem to prefer?
How densely or sparsely do they fill each page?
What evidence do you see of experimentation or problem-solving?
How does the sketchbook relate to the artist’s larger body of work?
Now, turn to a fresh page in your sketchbook. Create a drawing inspired by what you’ve observed about this artist’s process—not by copying their subject or style, but by adopting an aspect of their approach to sketchbook practice. Perhaps you’ll try their level of detail, the combination of media, or page organisation.
This exercise isn’t about emulation but about expanding your understanding of the diverse ways artists have used sketchbooks throughout history. By connecting to these traditions, you’ll develop a more intentional relationship with your sketchbook practice.
Drawing with Confidence
References
Google Arts & Culture. (n.d.). A Peek at Frida Kahlo’s Diary. [online] Available at: https://artsandculture.google.com/story/a-peek-at-frida-kahlo-s-diary-museo-dolores-olmedo/9AWxmDksayhmJA?hl=en.
Henry Moore Foundation. (2025). Henry Moore’s sketchbooks | Henry Moore Foundation. [online] Available at: https://henry-moore.org/discover-and-research/discover-henry-moore/henry-moores-sketchbooks/.
Joan Mitchell Foundation. (2021). Six Joan Mitchell Sketchbooks Digitized. [online] Available at: https://www.joanmitchellfoundation.org/journal/six-joan-mitchell-sketchbooks-digitized.
Pace Gallery. (2023). Picasso: 14 Sketchbooks | Pace Gallery. [online] Available at: https://www.pacegallery.com/exhibitions/picasso-14-sketchbooks/.
Van Gogh Museum (n.d.). Van Gogh’s Letters. [online] Van Gogh Museum. Available at: https://www.vangoghmuseum.nl/en/art-and-stories/stories/all-stories/van-goghs-letters.
Victoria and Albert Museum (2025). Constable’s sketchbook | Constable, John (RA) | V&A Explore The Collections. [online] Victoria and Albert Museum: Explore the Collections. Available at: https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O125849/constables-sketchbook-sketchbook-constable-john-ra/.
Victoria and Albert Museum (2019). V&A · Leonardo da Vinci’s notebooks. [online] Victoria and Albert Museum. Available at: https://www.vam.ac.uk/articles/leonardo-da-vincis-notebooks.
Wilson, J. (2004). Goya : drawings from his private albums.