How Artists Use Their Sketchbooks

‘How Artists Use Their Sketchbooks’ is a growing collection designed to help you and your learners build understanding as to what a sketchbook is and can be, straight from the perspective of practising artists. On this page, you’ll find videos sharing how artists across different disciplines use their sketchbooks.

The videos will encourage learners to think about the purpose of a sketchbook, what a sketchbook might look like, and how it might be used both professionally and personally.

You may spot that artists use them for notes, material tests, mindless doodles, thoughtful drawings, collages, marks, and thoughts and feelings. They might be big, small, bought or handmade, a series of separate sheets or simply a folded page.

How might this way of working benefit learners in your educational setting, or inspire the way you work in your own sketchbook?