Sketches of Music – Through the Sketchbook

Ludwig Van Beethoven writes and re-writes sketches (lines) of music on paper he sews together into books. He carries small notebooks with him to write down themes that come to him. He also returns to sketchbooks decades later to rework themes into something new. When he dies, in 1827, over 50 volumes of sketchbooks are found in his apartment and several hundred unbound pages, dating from 1792.

Ink and graphite.

Artist: Ludwig Van Beethoven.

More info and sketchbooks at the Beethoven-Haus Baun Digital Archives.

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.