Graphic: Inside the Sketchbooks of the World's Great Graphic Designers

  by Stephen Heller and Lita Talarico (Thames and Hudson)

From the book 'Graphic...', I've picked a few of my favourite sketchbook spreads that have inspired me for my own sketchbook. Firstly I was drawn to Bruno Bressolin's work. He's a photographer and illustrator who mainly works in advertising, and described the process of working into a sketchbook as 'a databank of concepts and ideas' that he often flicks through to select and mix and match imagery and text- whatever seems appropriate for his campaign. His sketchbook, unlike his work- which can often be political- is uncensored. What I enjoyed most was the range of surfaces Bressolin likes to draw/paint onto, including newsprint, newspaper, bible pages and tracing paper to name a few, resulting in not only fun experimental images but layered textual works as well.

Pep Carrio is another artist whose sketchbook pages I admired. He's a graphic designer who employs a m more regimented method by drawing 'an image a day'. Carrio seemed to particularly like incorporating found images as well as different styles each day to cover a range of subject matter and improve his drawing skills. I personally love the unintentional colour scheme and motifs Carrio has incorporated in his sketchbooks- the muted colours with occasional bursts. of red and blue, as well as lots of human silhouettes in black and white that link to natural-style doodles, which I find very affecting. 

I loved the more graphic/ abstract imagery of Jordi Duro's sketchbooks. Apparently the books themselves are hard to close due to the use of many different materials from Duro's 'artifacts' box. Sketchbooks for him are a way of documenting his life and processing his reactions to things, such as various news articles and music concerts. In terms of graphics, I was particularly drawn to the lettering experiments as this directly relates to my project. 

By actually looking directly at professional artists' sketchbooks, the imperfect, rough designs and playful experimentation, especially the interplay between image and text- overall it gives me a better sense of what my sketchbook can start out as in terms of processing my ideas surrounding language and emotion, two major components of graphic communication.