This is the last daily Morning Ink (see toward the end of this post for more details).
On my way home, on the Eurostar. I managed to go off in the wrong direction twice when I got to Paris. Ended up in the wrong Ibis first of all (a mistake I have made before), amd had to queue at reception for ten minutes before discovering that. Then went out to dinner, and went and walked about ten minutes in the wrong direction, even though the place I was heading for was practically opposite the hotel (it was one street down, which was where I went wrong; if it had actually been opposite, even I couldn’t have got it wrong). And I did that again this morning, walking away from the Gare de Lyon for quite a way before realising. I was looking at it on Google Maps the whole time, not just trying to wing it. I blame their user interface and the lack of clarity as to which direction the dot is going. Though, really, it’s obviously me.
Before that, though, I got to walk along the Cuvée Verte in the (light and refreshing) rain. Perfection.
I also loved the juxtaposition of the (presumably) official street art/mural with the more traditional (and presumably unofficial) graffiti style street art.
I have sometimes been a bit snobbish towards graffiti, even though I loved it as a teenager and really wanted to go add my own graffiti to some walls (I actually did add some to school desks and pub toilets), but that’s really fairly run-of-the-mill. I am trying to make more of a point to look at all street art and not only the sort that looks like it was probably a paid commission!
This will, I believe, be my last daily Morning Ink post. I will share daily on Notes (and possibly my Sketchbook Instagram account, though I am not 100% on that yet), and then share a weekly post with Morning Ink drawings.
I have also been thinking about what and how to share in addition and I will share a monthly process post taking you through one piece, or collection, from brief or idea, through to finish. And I will share a monthly inspiration and learning post, covering what has inspired me, illustration-wise, whether it’s new illustrators or patterns designers I have discovered, or historic art that I’ve been obsessing over, or a picture book that I’ve fallen in love with.
I think I will take more personal writing back over to Authentic Maximalism, though I do not make any promises on regularity there. I feel that I want to get back to focusing more on illustration and pattern design here.
(I also make no promises that I will stick with the above. If you’ve been here for a while, you will know that I have a propensity to pivot. But I would like to try for a while to see if I can maintain some consistency, especially given I have stock to the daily drawing for close to a year.)
I know some of you enjoy the daily posts, but I feel the time has come for me to stop them. Not the daily art itself. That is still important on many levels. I hope you’ll still enjoy seeing the art on a weekly basis, and perhaps also enjoy the longer monthly posts.
Thank you so much to those have you have followed along and opened the Morning Ink emails every day, or saved them up for weekends, perhaps.
Thanks so much for being here. Your presence on its own is a joy, but I love to hear from you, too, so please do feel free to leave a comment. About something that has resonated for you in today’s picture or in today’s words. Or about something completely unrelated. Tell me about your morning, your creative practice, your particular work or life juggling act. Anything. If you want to go even further you can take out a paid subscription – if you’re happy to give me your postal address I'll send you some art of some kind in the post.
And if you don’t like subscriptions (I totally get it!) you can ‘tip me’ instead. But really, your presence and comments are the best rewards – if they could be exchanged for food and electricity, I’d be so very happy.