I’ve tried to take up daily-art challenges before, and always fizzled after about a week. But something about the “Inktober” challenge that I read about in the most recent Guild of Natural Science Illustrators newsletter made me think, that’s achievable.

The basic assignment is to create one ink drawing per day for the month of October. Prompts are provided. The GNSI-related ones all focus, of course, on science subjects. But I did a little research and found that the broader challenge, posted at inktober.com, has another prompt list that’s very open-ended.

So I copied both prompt lists, and got to work. Here are the results so far; I’ll post the rest as I do them.

October 1: GNSI #1 was “botanical.” I was sketching with my friend Carole that day. She decided to try the prompt too. We went outside at her house; she picked a fireweed stalk and I picked a grass stem and a rush stem. Back inside, I opened up my big sketchbook, borrowed a hand lens from Carole, and did a quick ink comparison study.

October 2: I decided I want to be able to tape the Inktober drawings up as I complete them, building a kind of progressive mosaic. So I broke out a package of blank 3X5 cards to use for the rest of the month.

Carole and I had had a conversation about drawing horses the previous day, so I thought I would give it a try (haven’t drawn a horse for years). It fit just fine with the GNSI prompt for that day, “mammal.”

October 3: New realization: if this is going to be a challenge, I need to take a different approach. The first drawings were pretty much exactly what I’m comfortable with: tidy and realistic. But comfort is not where I want to be. Hence new parameters:

• Push the dark values (I have a tendency to stay very light)
• PLAY! Get creative, quirky, surreal. Have fun.

So here’s my response to the GNSI day-three prompt “tidal.” I’m fascinated by the way the tide will sometimes rise so gently that it lifts an empty clam shell like a boat. In time, waves tilt it just enough so the edge dips under, and it fills with water and flutters to the sand below.

October 4: The inktober.com prompt is “freeze.” Here is the pattern formed by early morning frost on the very dusty back window of our truck.

I felt it was fantastical enough to count as creative and surreal.

October 5: GNSI prompt is “airborne.” I stared at the 3X5 card for a while, tumbling the word in my mind but trying not to clutch at obvious straws–birds, dandelion seeds, insects. A winged shrimp fluttered into my musings. I drew it. It needed something large above it–a curved line became a rattlesnake with wings. The snake needed something to chase. And so on.

October 6: I put off the drawing until late in the evening; needed something quick. Inktober.com prompt for the day is “husky.” I challenged myself here to draw a husky quickly, with simple shapes, and without looking at any pictures.

October 7: Inktober.com prompt is “enchanted,” and GNSI prompt is “fish.” OK, I can pack both into one drawing.