I think about colour all the time. As I write this, I have a box with a wide assortment of coloured pencils opened beside me; I’m not doing anything with the pencils at the moment, I just really enjoy staring at the variety of colours, the shades, the subtle changes from one hue to another. Just looking at them all gives me immense joy. I gravitate towards some shades more than others, though I’ve noticed that this changes all the time. Lately, I’ve been drawing lots of portraits, and I’ve naturally been drawn towards all the skin tones. Aside from black and white, I’ve also found that red is a constant in portraits, which got me thinking about the nature of red itself.

For a few years now, I’ve been considering colouring pencils for making artworks, though there tends to be something holding me back from using them when it comes to putting thoughts down. Part of me wonders whether this is to do with an unspoken yet still received prejudice against colouring pencils; perhaps they are seen as somewhat unsophisticated, simple, childish. It’s interesting to me that colouring pencils have been a mainstay of almost everyone’s artistic path since they were very young, though at some point, they get forgotten. Having done some research into quality pencils lately, and having embarked on a daily drawing challenge, my love for them has been reawakened, so much so that I decided to write about them!

When I am working on a drawing or a painting, and I am moving backwards and forwards, squinting my eyes and tilting my head, wondering whether what I am making feels right, I ask myself why my ambition is to make works that match what I see with my eyes. Is it because I find works that closely resemble the real world are somehow more honest? Honest according to who? The reality being depicted is dependent on a series of artistic tricks that convince the viewer that what is being depicted is real - so how is that trickery a form of honesty? I guess realism then, is also a form of fantasy creation, a kind of convincing escape, a creation of a convincing parallel world.

Recently, I have been thinking a lot about masculinity and the imagery associated with manliness. I have also been thinking about the nude body, and life drawing, and the strange thing that happens when you look at a naked person in an art class setting, and you see the body as an assemblage of shapes, volumes, shade values, colour tones. In an art class setting, the nude body is de-sexualised and de-mystified. In turn, it’s like we are given permission to look unabashedly, to stare even, but that looking and staring is also a kind of consumption, a kind of digestion, before re-presenting on paper or canvas.