I am a big fan of daily drawing routines that anchor drawing firmly in my everyday life. In spring 2024, I drew one thing and one activity that I enjoy on index cards every morning over breakfast under the title “My favorite things”. The aim of this personal challenge was to focus my attention on something beautiful every morning during a rather stressful time and to capture it for myself – and in a way that I enjoy.
One effect of drawing in the morning was that I had the song “My favorite things” by Julie Andrews in my ears all day 😉 This gave me the idea that it would also be fun to draw songs. In May 2024, I then embarked on a drawing project in which I wanted to draw a French song that was on my mind every day. I had also just bought my first iPad and wanted to familiarize myself with the advanced functions of my drawing program and practice drawing portraits.
In my drawing program “Concepts”, I first developed a fixed frame in which the songs could be embedded and copied it 16 times. Experience has shown that 14-16 days is a good period for me to be able to draw really spontaneously and with pleasure. With longer periods, it can easily feel like an obligation and if I feel like I have to force myself to do something, or I get lost in details and perfectionism, I prefer to stop. I shared the pictures every day on Instagram and WhatsApp and ended up making little booklets out of them, which was a lot of fun. And I also created a YouTube playlist to make it easier to listen to the songs.
Since songs are still constantly running through my head, I have now started a second round of “La Chanson du Jour” at the beginning of August 2024. In principle, I’ve planned 16 songs again, which will make the little booklets twice as thick 😉 But maybe with a third round in the fall I’ll get to 52 songs by the end of the year – then I could make a weekly calendar for 2025 in which each week has its own song. That would be nice too! 🙂
