The Wonderful Imperfection of Hand Drawn Design
In the design world, the ultimate outcome of every piece of art created to appear on a product of some kind, no matter how it originates, becomes a digital composition printed via digital mediums. What we may create entirely by hand will end up being outputted by a machine. Even prints of original artwork are digitized to be mass-produced.
This isn’t a criticism from an artist who bemoans the digital world and its influence on art. I LOVE working with my iPad Pro and Apple Pencil. It has revolutionized my work and made me a happy girl!
I think that’s why I’ve recently fallen in love with making marks by hand, especially when using a digital device like an iPad. There’s nothing quite like brush or pen to paper, or tablet, that creates a connection between the artist and the work they create. I love the imperfection that is achieved even with digital media. I may have well used a brush and paint or ink because that’s what it looks like.
For many years when digital drawing became popular via Adobe Illustrator or Photoshop, the goal was to achieve a perfect line, a perfect curve. Why? Because you could. I still love making a perfect line with the assistance of Adobe and other digital products and couldn’t live without them. However, recently I’ve begun to respect the imperfect line that only my wobbly hand can achieve. It says something important – I’ve been here. Thanks Apple.
Blue Collage is a repeat pattern (believe it or not) created using Paper 53, cut up into pieces and reassembled digitally as a collage. The perfect marriage of hand design and what I call “digital assist” is why I love to get up every day and create art. Hope you enjoy it too.
Available on Society 6 as an art print and a whole lot of other useful and fun products I think you’ll enjoy. Click on the link above and it will take you there. If you would prefer a hand-signed giclee print from my website store, click here.