#The100DayProject is a free global art project that takes place online each year. The idea is simple. You choose a creative project, do it every single day for 100 days, and share your process on social using the hashtag #The100DayProject.
I did it for the first time in 2020. I had long fancied joining in but my little demon kept telling me I was too flaky and couldn't possibly commit to doing something EVERY day for ONE HUNDRED days! So when it popped up just into our first uk lockdown in 2020, starting in April and finishing in July, I figured, if not now, when?! After all, we merrily thought the pandemic would be drawing to a close by that July...!
I chose to do 100 days of life drawing, with particular focus on the areas I tended to avoid...such as hands and feet, and faces. I often ended up quickly sketching one of my hands or feet at 5 minutes to midnight in order to not skip a day (not that it matters if you do) and I felt that pull to keep it going. When I had got to about 20 days it was fun and I could see that I was learning. I found some good resources to give me different ways to practice stuff like drawing hands and feet and was enjoying educating myself, improving my skill....this dragged me deeper and deeper into the 100 days. I thought I was simply improving my skill....yet I was learning, stretching myself too. I was, as I still am, taking part in around 3 life drawing session a week thanks to zoom. (Not as odd as you'd think, like watching a subtitled film, your brain soon compensates) In between these I did a lot of drawings of my husband, reading, scrolling on his phone (it was lockdown after all!), sketched my friends during a zoom social (below) plus lots of self portraits using my ipad camera or a mirror, and, of course, my own hands and feet...very conveniently placed. But soon I decided I might try drawing myself...yes...NUDE. Uhoh. I thought this would be horrific...after all....I was eating a lot of pizza and ice cream at the time and the lockdown weight was adding extra curves!
I sat in front of a mirror, behind the largest sketchbook I could find and drew myself. Not so bad.
So then I continued to get a little braver....after all...who is to know it's me...and who cares?!
As I drew myself, I was focused, as I do when drawing others, on the landscape of the body, each inch, each line, each curve. I was lost in the process.
After, when I looked at what I had drawn, I found a new beauty and a new love of my own body. My body positivity radically improved and to this day, I continue to draw and paint myself on a regular basis to maintain this feeling. I have a self portrait hung prominently, yet privately, at home and each day this connects me to the feeling or confidence and self empowerment that I felt as I created it. This process was the birth of my Body Love Portrait commission offering and have now fine tuned and enriched the process, working with a growing tribe of amazing clients.
All of this grew from my 100 days project! You never really know where it will lead you. I started it hoping to improve my hand drawing skill...I now LOVE to draw a good hand, they are exciting, not terrifying now. Yet I gained so very much more!
This year I will be aiming for 100 days of Portraits of various different techniques. I'll keep you posted here and you can follow it on Instagram at #100daysofportraits
If you want to join in the 9th annual #The100DayProject check out the website at
Projects do not have to be art or craft related, so anyone can join in. Save the date: the next round starts February 13, 2022.
See you there!
KM 12/2/22
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