Du Art | What to Paint or Draw During The Quarantine

Quarantined days during the Covid-19 pandemic surely make us wonder about what hobby we should try or revisit. some people learn knitting, sewing, gardening, cooking, you name it. It opens a side in ourselves that we didn't even realize having or has been forgotten for a long time. For me, it's my love of drawing and painting.

Did you ever remember having a faint memory about the joy inside your heart every time you are doodling in your school book?  Do you have pile of abandoned art supplies somewhere in your house that was once became your dearest possessions? Do you ever miss creating a painting or drawing for someone dear? 

When I was a kid, my dad was in his busiest working era. He barely stayed at home to the point that returning home became some kind of celebration for little me. One time, I was waiting for him to come home. He said that he will be home at 11 p.m, but the 8-year-old me was too sleepy and 9 p.m was my bedtime. So I grabbed crayons and an A4 80 GSM white HVS paper and drew for him. It was a drawing of me, my mom, my younger brother, and a random cat (despite us not having any cats at that time) in a party venue, welcoming him. I pasted that drawing on my parents' door and then went to sleep. I kept doing that for a while, my mom saved the first one for me. That drawing is now framed and hanged in my bedroom.

You might also have some kind of memory of your favorite moment related to drawing and/or painting. Can you please share your stories down below in the comment section? I would like to hear your stories. Whether you are starting out our revisiting old hobby, here are things you can paint/draw:

1. Flowers in Your Neighborhood (or Your Garden)

The physical distancing policy is still being implemented. Luckily, as a step to maintain our health, we still can (advised, actually) to go out and get some sun in the morning. We can still wear our mask and go for a short walk, jog, or even a bicycle ride (as long as you are riding your own bike and bringing your own water bottle). During the quick workout outing, look around and take some time to appreciate your surroundings. Your neighbor may have planted a new flower, the neighborhood park might have some new installations, etc. Take a picture and use the pic as a drawing reference. One thing to remember during the reference hunting process: try not to touch anything public or anyone

I found these flowers in a little green space of a church next to my house:

Spider lilies! This was painted after the "daisy" one. As you may see, I did not add any background to the painting and just let the flower to pop. However, I got curious and wanted to try other options to fill my background. I looked at the colour wheel theory and found out that purple compliments green. Thus, I put the blue first and then added a stream of red using the wet on wet techniques and let the two colours blend on the paper and not on the palette. But then I wanted to add a wash of yellow to represent the sunlight and ended up creating an overwhelming background. I got too adsorbed to the wet on wet techniques that the paper started buckling lol. The buckling is severe, that it is still visible even after the scanning process.

These daisies inspired me to try painting leaves and white flowers. I always have this impression that "white" in nature is not a pure FFFFFF white, but a combination of light-washed colours from the reflections of nearby colours. It was challenging to create the perfect colour combination to paint white flowers. Yes, I am aware of the awkward leaf veins and I am working on my lifting techniques to create smooth and realistic veins on leaves~

I used the 12 half-pans Koi Watercolors Pocket Field Sketch Box and mixed it with the Cotman Water Colours Field Box 12 Half-Pans on XL Aquarelle for those two pieces.

2. Fan Art

We tend to watch more things during the quarantine. I love watching Bon Appetit's Youtube Channel, I also love Christina and Delaney. When this video came out, I knew I want to make a fanart out of the scene in that video. The drawing was more of a challenge as I hardly draw human figures and clear bottles.

The proportions are messy and painting skin color is intimidating to me. Things I am satisfied with the painting were the "clear effect" of the soda bottle and those sandwiches. I drew that using Staedtler Luna Watercolour Pencils on Canson XL Aquarelle Cold Pressed Heavyweight Paper.

My other fanart is quite recent, after watching Goldson's video on oil pastel drawing, I actually wanted to try oil pastel again as an adult (Goldson is amazing! Check out her channel, she does a lot of oil pastel drawings and other media. Her videos are lovely, worth supporting for <3). So I drew Lee Youngja, a South Korean comedian. For the drawing, I was using Pentel Oil Pastels on Canson Aquarelle paper. Might want to try using the Mix Media instead,but for now I gotta work with what I have. As for Lee Youngja, I am a fan of her, but sadly I don't know how to show this drawing to her since I don't have social media (lol). I mailed her business e-mail but alas, I can't write Korean. Hoping for a miracle that someday she can see this fanart :')

3. Attempting to Recreate Other Artist's Piece and Try Their Techniques

Sometimes, when we are watching videos from artists, we feel inspired and intrigued by their techniques. I tried to use the Negative Painting technique to paint the leaves in my daisy painting. Makoccino introduced the technique to me through this video:

I also came across ANJA's video where she combined Bob Ross painting from his several videos into one painting to fill out her bedroom wall. The beach reminded me that I haven't painted a beach scene for a long time. Hence I browsed for the original tutorial and tried Bob Ross's Mountain by The Sea painting.


The thing is, I don't own any acrylic/gouache paints. Therefore, I tweaked things up and try to recreate the painting using my Watercolour Pencils. We can layer lighter colours on the darker ones with acrylic and gouache paints, but not with watercolour paints. I don't have any white pen or any white-out, it was fun trying not to forget the whites.

I might consider buying some white pens. 

Update!!! After getting so inspired to draw with oil pastels, I bought Pentel Oil Pastel in 49 colors, some paper stumps, and a correction fluid/ whiteout. Most artists are using Posca Markers to add highlights to their oil pastel drawings, but I went on a budget so I bought correction fluid instead, with half the price. It works just fine for me. With the new media and tools, I tried new techniques on highlighting and creating droplet effects, yay!

On the top is Moon Drops (my fav grape variety) with dripping rainwater and below that is Tokyo Tower seen from a window after rain. I think the water is too viscous in the Moon Drops drawing since I ran out of black marker so I used black oil pastel instead and the droplets in the window one is not quite satisfactory. Guess I have to buy some black markers and try a bunch of water droplets drawing, lol.

On the top is a painting using watercolor, but with the additional whiteout highlighting. On the bottom is a drawing from my recent trip going back to the city from my hometown. It was 4.50 p.m, the sky was still light blue and on the left side of the road, the sun is still up, shining brightly. However, on the other side of the road, the moon had already up too, almost in the same height as the sun. Also on the right side of the road, 2 kids (or people) were playing kite. I tried to capture that moment and though wasn't satisfied yet with my oil pastel work, I am content with the captured moment.

We are in this together. Let's hope that we can soon be out and about, looking for painting inspirations, doing a live painting in public, or even buying new art supplies without worrying about over sanitizing the products that we bought. 

Good luck.