Saturday, October 15, 2022

Inktober 2022, a few pieces

 This year I decided - on a whim - to participate in Inktober. I've seen artist friends tag some of their drawings "inktober," but didn't look beyond that. And some of my writer-visual artist friends and acquaintances. But it has not been anything I've considered for myself or had even looked into.

I decided that this year, with the now almost three years of continuous comics workshops I've been doing, and that I published a haiku comics chapbook, maybe this was my year to join. So I did. I decided on day two, so I made two drawings. Day three another drawing. Then I also decided to start doing daily writing because ...tada... November is just around the corner and - yes, I'll be doing that again. It's been a while since I've written every day, so I thought that maybe drawing as a warmup for NaNoWriMo wasn't quite enough.

On about, oh, day five or six, I noticed someone mention an Inktober prompt.

Prompt? There are prompts for Inktober?!

Yes, indeed. An Instagram search - because isn't Inktober kind of made for Instagram - found an "offical Inktober prompts" list, as well as many variations. Some individual prompts, it seemed, some group prompts. Which made me feel better, because I wasn't using prompts, I was just drawing.

Now, I'm still pantsing my Inktober drawings, but of course! But one day I was stuck in the grief mud, so I opened my writing Instagram account, where I saved as a favorite the Inktober prompts story I'd posted, and took that day's prompt from the "official" list and drew. It worked!

Here is a sampling of my Inktober drawings. I've also noticed that I'm starting to add more words into most of my drawings. No surprise. A writer writes, right?

In the heart of the city
there is a soul
still beating out
a
rhythm.
Do you hear her?

Transition: final appointment with my longtime naturopath and acupuncturist,
who is retiring at the end of the month. 

Introducing
Franz, the portable outhouse cleaner, who likes his job because it gives him reason to be a martyr;
 Mavis, a siren of the soliloquies, a gentle soul sent to give a message to Franz;
and The River People, who are in need of a helping hand and not another rando saint.