Sketchtravel: Around the world through 71 artists's worlds

EPIC. Dice gave me the book back in 2007. And now the project that seemed so far off is done. It's been a long journey for Dice and though I wasn't there it's almost as if I can see how it all culminated. And who was the final artist on the book? Sketchtravel TV, the end of the journey...

The book, as in, THE ENTIRE book, will be auctioned off on October 17, 2011 in Brussels. I know, one person gets to walk away with this one book. Amazing. I won't be there but I wish them all good fortune. It is for a very good cause. Who's in it, you ask?

This traveling museum contains the personal visions of 71 exceptional illustrators, animators and comic book artists, including artists such as Bill Plympton, James Jean, Rebecca Dautremer, Glen Keane, Frederick Back, and Hayao Miyazaki. Initiated by illustrators Dice Tsutsumi (Japan) and Gerald Guerlais (France), the project will culminate in an auction of the original book in Brussels on October 17, 2011. Proceeds from the auction and royalties from the book's publication will be donated to the international literacy non-profit, Room to Read.

My participation in all this is just as a silent partner who watched as Dice and Gerald did all of the heavy lifting. But I did manage to document it back when I was years younger and had better time management skills. Check that out here

My congratulations to the entire team and all the artists involved. May good luck and angels watch over you all.


Sketchtravel website

Sketchtravel Blog

Room to Read

Da Drawings

The Buddha at Kamakura. A train trip and a hike to visit the old boy. He is huge and quite a sight. He sat very still for this portrait.

Sketching on the trip. These are the sketches done while on our merry way. Drawing in trains is surprisingly manageable (man, most of the trains don't even make noise. We might as well have been skating on ice rather than rolling on wheels). Of course one has to be even more nimble with the drawing.


When in Economy and not in a window seat, one has to make do with the view facing front. In this case it was the small t.v. screen which shows the camera view from the front of the plane. Pretty clouds up there.


My train victims. Drawing victims, that is. They now populate my sketchbook and blog (insert stock villain laughter here). The girl at lower left was just one passenger apart from me and I was blatantly drawing her. At one point she curled her nose but did not flick me a look though I was very obviously drawing her. That's resolve, man.


More train drawings. The girl was with her boyfriend and she was obviously enamored of him because of the way she talked and looked at him. Ahhh, young love. Ain't it grand?


Clothes make the man. This guy's attire had some personality, though I had a crappy vantage point. Color would have helped but, hey, I was on a moving train, alright? One cannot be too picky in street sketching.


This girl could easily have won an asian Kate Moss contest. I didn't do her justice in the sketch but I think it's close. She was with her mom at Narita having a snack before the flight. She noticed me drawing her and I think she became more animated after that. Very charming young lady. That coat she was wearing was also quite a statement and not the usual.

Oh, and I did Sketchcrawl drawings, too. I wasn't lazy, or anything. Those images are up on the Sketchcrawl forum. Check out the bounty of drawings done on that day in Japan as well as the rest of the world.

Sketchcrawl Forum