Sketchbook page, during the One Week 100 People Challenge 2024
The 1-Week Challenge – One Week 100 People 2024
At the end of winter, I was getting restless and looking for something new to sketch. Then I learned about a Challenge that Liz Steel and Marc Taro Holmes do every year in March. It’s called “One Week 100 People” (#OneWeek100People).
The goal, in their words on the website: “Sketch as many people as you can in 5 days either from life or from photos and see if you can reach 100. You can do this any way you like – simple pencil/pen drawings are totally fine – and you can take more time if you need!
The idea is simply to push yourself to do more people sketching than you would normally do. There is something special about striving for a big goal of 100 people sketches! Find out more about the challenge on Marc’s blog here.”
It looked interesting, and drawing people is something I’d never done. In fact, I’d stayed away from it because it always seemed “too hard” to do. I thought the Challenge would give me a structure and also accountability. And one week was do-able. So I signed up.
Then I calculated . . . 100 people in 5 days. That’s 20 per day. Where would I find 20 people in a day to sketch? ! The library. A coffee shop. A supermarket.
For myself, I decided two things: I wanted to sketch people in ways that I would really continue to include people in my sketches, and it would be OK with me if I didn’t reach 100 people. (I did 65. And that was OK.)
The first day was a trip to the library. Surprisingly, few people where there. My favorite sketch for that day was someone who leaned over the Librarian’s desk to talk with her.
Next day was to a Whole Foods store. I bought lunch there, and ate it at the tables located just past the cashiers. And . . . sketched the cashiers and some of the customers. This was interesting, because they’re always moving.
Another day was from TV and streaming. Again, always moving.
What did I learn from the “100 People, One Week” Challenge? First, it’s not as hard as I expected to draw people. And it was a lot more fun than I’d expected. And people certainly do add to a scene. I’ll add them to my sketches more than I have before.
I’m already looking forward to next year’s Challenge!
