Inktober art
Events that build communities are a wonderful and beloved thing, and sometimes it only takes a little inspiration and a little magic for global engagements in certain trends. Inktober is one such event.
Born out of the need to improve by practice, what was started by one person rapidly picked up the pace and became a worldwide event, not just for experienced artists, but also for those starting out and even the occasional dabblers.
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- Art by Vishwa
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- Art by Nivanka
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- Art by Matheesh
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- Art by Chrishari
We had a conversation with a few members of the local art community to see what they learned.
Nivanka Fernando, experienced digital artist, recalls inktober in past years as something that helped her build drawing stamina and discipline as an artist while keeping the creativity alive. For Nivanka, this is her fourth inktober since her start in 2016.
“Sometimes life gets in the way and I do miss a few days but catching up and completing the prompts whenever you can is a lot more important than finishing exactly on time because the goal is improvement.” she tells us.
Inktober was impactful for Vishwa Karunarathne, mainly because it enabled him to go out of his comfort zone, especially in terms of technique. “Since I do not treat inktober works as serious pieces of work per se, it feels easier to experiment with.” he says. His unique interpretations of the drawing prompts have already drawn the attention of many.
Chrishari De Alwis
Gunasekare, considers inktober her learning experience, and each year she picks a particular skill she wants to improve on. This year, her focus was digital art.
Comic illustrator and artist Matheesha Gunaratne defines inktober as the practice board. “It gives you consistent practice, and you see yourself improving the longer you work on it” was his conclusion.
Vishwa and Matheesha both started inktober just after Nivanka, in 2017, with Chrishari following in 2018. Vishwa reflects that each year, the number of drawings he was able to complete went up, as did the number of his friends who tried inktober along with him. Chrishari too, focuses more on quality over quantity, delivering around 10 well thought out pieces of art each year.
For Matheesha, it’s consistency, and he pushes to finish all the prompts during the month. The year 2019 was a brilliant success for him, having completed 31 drawings, perfectly timed with one each day.
Last year with a pandemic raging all through the month, the experience was quite different. Chrishari notes that less local artists joined inktober this year, however she doesn’t believe it’s a direct result of the pandemic. Nivanka mentioned that stress brought on by the pandemic took its toll, but the artistic community, a supportive and lively unit, made it “impossible to just give up when there were so many people cheering you on.”
For both Matheesha and Vishwa, the pandemic was a blessing in disguise as that increased the spare time they had, which translated into more time spent on their art.
All of them agree that Inktober was definitely a new experience last year. Nivanka mentions that it was the first time she tried multiple prompts in a day, while for Matheesha this was the year he opted for more ambitious and complex interpretations of the prompts. Vishwa explored different themes and titles this year, and Chrishari is content with the progression her drawings took from simple to complex.
All of them agree on one thing. They’d do it again. They’re all looking forward to this year’s inktober, with Matheesha adding that “I intend to bring something better to the table.”