This month’s question from the Illoguild substack is “How do you get inspiration from your particular surroundings.”
I live in a small town in the French Jura mountains, my daily walks are mostly to the local bakery, past cow pastures and gardens, through the parks and down sleepy streets. Not a very glamorous place for getting inspired to sketch something other than landscape, I thought.
But then one day I spotted this lady on the park bench, she must have been walking her little dog when she took a break, sat down and made a phone call. The way she held her slippery smart phone with both hands and furrowed her brow, trying to catch what was being said on the other end through the noise of the nearby playground, immediately caught my attention. I took out my phone, muted the telltale snapping sound of the shutter and discretely took a picture.
Later that day I tried sketching the scene from my stalker photo reference and maybe it was the secretive way the picture way taken or the lady’s hunched posture but what came out was this: a spy grandma on a secret mission. Her faithful companion is keeping an eye on a suspicious pigeon while she tries to send a secret message, all under the guise of a little old lady out walking her dog…
Where do you find your drawing inspiration?