Through the Sketchbook

What has the sketchbook been in the past and what can it be today? Together this website demonstrates how sketchbooks cross disciplines, skills, cultures, gender, and class etc., to gain a better understanding.

The sketchbooks appear here not necessarily for the 'name' of the artist, but for the different thinking and seeing through the sketchbook.

This web site and all images are for education purposes only.

Visual images on this web site are copyright protected - permissions were sought and received to the best of my knowledge and ability.

To begin, click on any image.

© Copyright 2022, Lesa Moriarity. All rights reserved. Independently Funded Visual Art Projects

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George Back
Egheechololle, a Dog-Rib Indian, winter 1825-1826. Image source: Library and Archives Canada.

The Arctic sketchbook is a record of the activities and sightings by the English Navy Private George Back. He did drawings of the sea, the native people they meet, the boats they travel in, coastlines and landscapes, and details of plants and animals circa early 1800s. On the watercolor sky study (to the right), the artist makes extensive notes on colors.

 

Pencil on wove paper, and watercolor over pencil, and scrapes on wove paper.

 

Artist: George Back.

 

The George Back Collection, at Library and Archives Canada.

George Back
Montreal Island, Chantrey Inlet, Northwest Territories, August 1, 1834. Image source: Library and Archives Canada.
George Back
Right: Sky study, with extensive notes on colours, March 3, 1820. Image source: Library and Archives Canada.
George Back Collection
Eskimos Approaching the Boats, Shoalwater Bay, Yukon, July 7, 1826. Image source: Library and Archives Canada.