What do you do with your studies?

[J Wilson]

I started thinking today about all of those sketches and studies that we artists produce. If most artists are anything like me they have drawers full of sketches and studies, more or less rotting. It's seems like a waste and a shame.

Sometimes if I have a study I particularly like I may display it. Sometimes a friend may see a study and like it, and it becomes a gift. Otherwise, in the drawer it goes. It occurred to me that these are potentially valuable to someone. If you were to gather a few artists from an area and have a massive community "artist tag sale" I'm betting many artists would walk away with a nice little chunk of change, and there would be some very happy people who may not otherwise buy art, which to me enriches society as more people SHOULD enjoy art.

So I'm curious, what do other artists do with all of those little random bits of artwork they produce? Does anyone else have ideas on ways to share the love of art in a way that is accessable to the average person who wouldn't normally give art a second thought (this may be an offshoot idea, but I think one of the reasons that tattoos are gaining a widespread acceptance is because it's an accessable and common way for people to appreciate art- which tells me more people DO want art in their lives but maybe feel that "Art" is for the wealthy or cultural elite).

[Whitevillage]

I still have most of my studies and I keep them in plastic file holders. It´s fun to skim trough sometimes when you´re feeling that you suck or don´t know what to improve on.

[FranciscoShreds]

Most of my studies are in their sketchbooks. That way there's less risk of losing them and I can thumb through them any time I want. To be truthful, I never figured I'd do anything with them other than keeping them in a pile somewhere. Most of them are anatomy/skeletal studies or gestures and who would want a drawing of a leg with no skin. :P

[Nibras]

It's my journey and my progress
These pieces are special to me, they may be crap but I can never sell them....
Am really afraid of where am gonne put all of them in 5 years time.....

[Peter Coene]

I have the traditional ones in boxes and stuff, the digital ones are stored up on my lacie hard drive. I keek telling myself that I'm going to do through the figure studies and use them to inspire me for poses to use, but usually by the time i could be doing that I'm already working on whatever I'm going to work on. The digital ones often end up being reused to build up textures and stuff in new paintings (that was a trick I learned from Craig Mullins when he did a demo at Art Center)

[SoufMeng]

Most of them are anatomy/skeletal studies or gestures and who would want a drawing of a leg with no skin. :P
Me!!!!!!
If yours are like these (your price will be mine) shoot me a pm with your prices! ;)

[J Wilson]

Most of my studies are in their sketchbooks. That way there's less risk of losing them and I can thumb through them any time I want. To be truthful, I never figured I'd do anything with them other than keeping them in a pile somewhere. Most of them are anatomy/skeletal studies or gestures and who would want a drawing of a leg with no skin. :P

Ah, that's kind of my point. Most of us never have any plan for them, and we ourselves don't really place value on them, because they are just training, or rough ideas, or part of the process. To many other people though, those little bits of art would be at least pretty cool, and in just the right person's hands priceless (imagine owning a small rough from a favorite artist, tell me you wouldn't treasure it). If they essentially hold little to no value to us, why not part with them to get more people appreciating art? Get them comfortable with the idea of owning art again.

[BlackGuy]

If you're saving them, then I promise you they will have value 1, 5, 10 years down the road. Old artwork always brings sentiment and nostalgia when you take a glance at the things you used to study, or the sketches you did just because. It's always fun to see how much you've improved too. I keep a big crate of all the sketchbooks I've had for the past 7 years or so, I think I've got one that goes back to middle school.

[Peter Coene]

I have the traditional ones in boxes and stuff, the digital ones are stored up on my lacie hard drive. I keek telling myself that I'm going to do through the figure studies and use them to inspire me for poses to use, but usually by the time i could be doing that I'm already working on whatever I'm going to work on. The digital ones often end up being reused to build up textures and stuff in new paintings (that was a trick I learned from Craig Mullins when he did a demo at Art Center)

[Asatira]

I tend to toss most of my current gestures; they're usually from Posemaniacs and used as a warm-up more than anything. But my life drawing gestures and my other studies I tend to keep, either in the sketchbook they were drawn in or put in a box if they were loose papers/sketchpad. I will occasionally look back at them to see how I've progressed or to be reminded of topics I haven't looked at in a while.

[Carl Dobsky]

That's funny. I've been thinking about this recently. It seems to me that it would be a shame to let all that work go to waste. So I've been looking for the ones that have something more interesting than whether or not they're technically good or bad but rather have something evocative about them or that suggest some sort of narrative or story. They could be a great start or spring board into a new idea or pose for a painting. Of course, more drawings and studies would have to be done based off these to turn them into something more usable. At any rate, it might be better than starting from scratch all the time.
Sorry. I think I'm just rambling.

[OmenSpirits]

Sitting in one of those large plastic storage bins in my closet. I looked through them a few weeks ago. I looked through my sketchbooks to see where I've been, & realize where I could have gone.

If only...............


But I'm getting there. :)

[FactorZero]

It would be kinda of cool if people exchanged studys, artist to artist. One way to get rid of something and get something else in return.

[Viridis]

Meh. I do so few studies... I keep my loose sketches in a folder or in a sketchbook, and those I keep around to look through every now and then. But all the old studies I did in figure drawing classes, all the gestures and whatever... I pitched almost all of them into the recycling bin except for the few I particularly liked. Most of them were crap, they're on newsprint anyway, and I don't have the space or the inclination to store them. >_> I move way too often to bother keeping anything that doesn't absolutely need to stay.

[FranciscoShreds]

Me!!!!!!
If yours are like these (your price will be mine) shoot me a pm with your prices! ;)

Hah! If I was that good then I'd probably be more willing to sell stuff.

[deepbluehue]

I usually store my sketches and studies in piles and stacks. I've thrown a lot of drawings away. I've also wondered what to do with them.

Portland has Open Studios in October where local artists open their studios to the public and people go on a walking tour of studios in their neighborhoods. It's a great way to get people interested in art. I haven't participated in the Open Studio yet, I'm a little nervous about it and there is an entry fee. Maybe people would be interested in buying drawings if they weren't priced too high. How much can you charge for a sketch or study? Is $25 reasonable for a little sketch or is that too little?

[Wooly ESS]

I do almost all of my sketches/studies in sketchbooks. That keeps them together, reasonably organized and prevents them from getting lost.

[DavePalumbo]

if it's in my sketchbook, it stays there and probably gets looked at by nobody but me. I go comb through them now and again for unused ideas and seeds, but that's mostly it. If it's an oil sketch or whathaveyou, I like to put that stuff on my blog and CAsb so long as I'm reasonably happy with it. Sometimes I sell them, mostly I just file them away :shrug:

It's really hard for me to destroy old work no matter how much I hate it, but I do have a reasonable amount of stuff packed up in the basement that would be better off lining the fireplace...

[CCThrom]

Yup - sketchbooks stay as sketchbooks, the rest goes 'in the drawer'.

There is potentially a fair amount of value stored there, IF it were cleaned up and put into better presentation format... nice idea, but yeech what a lot of work.

[Black Spot]

I’ve got stuff from my early teens and I really need to get everything sorted into some sort of chronological order instead of cardboard tubes and numerous folders. Having a big gap means that it’s not massive, but I still have to find a few things stored in the attic that I know I haven’t thrown away and saw a few years ago. It’s sort of fun looking through the old stuff.