reflection on summer creative retreat 2026
One of my current art inspirations is Katie Moody, a mixed media sketchbook artist who makes dreamy loose landscapes in cheery colors. She shared on Instagram that she would be one of the featured artists at the online Summer Creative Retreat hosted by Peggy Dean of the Pigeon Letters. Since the event was free (with the ability to replay recordings for an additional week), I knew it would be a good idea to try it out.
The first workshop I attended was Playful Lettering: Create Your Retreat Cover Page w/Peggy Dean. My dad gifted me a set of acrylic markers for my birthday last month, and, since they're still a new material to me, I decided to experiment with them for this spread. The theme was to doodle freely as though this were your notebook from when you were a kid; while I didn't fully let loose, it was still fun to not focus on what I don't understand about lettering.
The rest of the page features warm-up exercises from Start Silly! Fun & Simple Warm Ups to Start Sketching w/Jenni Macklin. We turned ordinary objects into cats, made jelly monsters, and sleepy dogs. My favorite ended up being the little poodle, which led me to draw another floofball during the next exercise.
Perusing the roster of featured workshops, I knew I was going to enjoy Dapper Dogs: Drawing Pups with STYLE w/Brandon Campbell. I have very little experience drawing dogs, but I love animal artwork and I thought this would be a good way to introduce me to their form. Brandon had great tips for how to simplify their shapes and it was another good way to play around with markers and ink. I've learned that these acrylics don't layer the best on textured paper, but I'm going to keep experimenting with that in a smoother sketchbook.
Katie Moody's landscape workshop, Loosen Up Your Landscapes, did not disappoint. It was a good exercise in letting go of control, especially since I was using watercolor which doesn't layer the way that her gouache does. There are plenty of elements that I look at that I would want to improve (thinking about the composition with the river, varying the colors in the background more, letting in more light for the sky), but this is my first time attempting to do a landscape at all. Letting myself make a little mess of lines and blobs on the page is a big step for me in not letting a fear of failure stop me from trying.
Next year, I really want to travel so I tuned in to watch Sketchbook Souvenirs: Capturing travel memories with limited time w/Alicia Bruce. I like how she simplified elements from the photos focusing on only a couple art supplies at a time and not trying to fully render every line or component of a photograph or moment in time.
Oh Mahr Win is another painter that I have followed on Instagram for a while and her style is very intimidating to me. It's loose, water-heavy, and subjects that I don't tend to paint often (florals and food.) Paint the Glow: Loose Watercolour Apple Made Simple was the last workshop that I watched and I'm glad I gave it my best attempt especially since it was outside my comfort zone. If I can take away one thing from this workshop, it's that I want to practice painter bigger, confident strokes, and not being too afraid of using more water.
While this barely scratches the surface of the workshops that were offered, I am glad that this curated selection really pushed me to grip my pencils and brushes less tight, be sillier, and experiment with color and shape. I'll definitely participate again next year!
Thank you for reading! Źįµį“„įµŹ
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