In July at TAC (Thursday art club) our challenge was to create some artworks on black paper using the theme ‘collections’.

I gathered together my collection of postcards as my inspiration for the theme and my black sketchbook which I hadn’t used for quite some time.

I have collected quite a few postcards over the past few years, partly because my husband signed me up to a gift subscription to Art post. (this post isn’t sponsored!)

The art post describes themselves as:

“ a group of friends, and art curators from Sheffield, England, on a mission to help curate some of the most wonderful artistic talent the world has to offer – connecting art lovers globally with artists through our emerging art postcard subscription, emerging art, and greetings card shop. Raising funds for mental health charities across the UK and Europe.”

I decided to create some artworks on black paper inspired by some of the art on the postcards I collected- combining different artworks together to make new compositions.

This was an interesting and fun challenge pushing me out of my comfort zone. Recently I have been enjoying creating more pieces that contain imaginative elements and narrative rather than just focusing on still life, landscape and portraiture. I liked and was surprised by how vibrant the coloured pencil became on the black paper background. This project felt quite playful and expressive- not having to worry about creating something that looked perfect or made sense took a lot of pressure away and made it an enjoyable process.

I had another play with the black sketchbook and coloured pencils whilst on a coffee date with my husband in Starbucks.