Here’s looking at YOU kids!!

One of the core aims of Sketch Appeal is to support and improve your mental health through the joy of mindful, experimental drawing and creative play. So, to mark World Mental Heatlh Day 2019, we’re setting a very special sketching challenge - all about YOU!

We’re inviting you to lose control, sketch yourself free and let your ‘other half’ out to play! Your inner child, your alter ego: whatever you wanna call it, we want you to let it ART!

What?

Your challenge is to draw 2 colourful self-portraits: 1 with your dominant hand and then another, using your non-dominant hand. These can be quick sketches and please don’t overthink or labour over them, but we’d love them to be colourful, because it will be more uplifting for you to create and for us to admire!

When?

Share them on Instagram on World Mental Health Day this Thursday 10th October and tag us in it @Sketchappeal, using #LetItART , along with whatever comment /self-reflection you wish to make about the portraits and your experience creating them. Which one did you enjoy drawing more? Which one captures your true character most? Can you see different sides of yourself coming through?

Why?

We’re setting this challenge to prove that there’s no faster or more fun way to unlock and unleash the artist and child within than drawing with your non-dominant hand! It’s the easiest way to ‘lose control’ and let your creativity pour out. Tests and studies have shown the therapeutic and mood-boosting benefits of drawing (and writing) with your non-dominant hand: someone has even written a book all about it!

If you’ve attended any of our events then you’ll be familiar with our signature power drawing warm-up. Sketchers draw a series of 4 portraits of the person sitting opposite – including 1 with their non-dominant hand. Time and again, it’s THAT portrait that captures the person’s essence and is the portrait that both sitter and sketcher prefer. It’s also the one that people seem to be most uplifting (whilst initially unnerving and terrifying!) to draw: the one that pushes people out of their controlled comfort zone and into the spirit of creative play.

If you’ve met me (Dulcimer, creator of all this sketchy stuff!), you’ll know that I’m a huge advocate and fan of non-dominant drawing. In fact, I try to do it every day: right after I’ve sketched something with my right hand. It’s a tiny but hugely-beneficial and fun act of rebellion against the side of me that spends the rest of the day trying too hard to be ‘good’ at stuff.

Dominant-hand drawing always makes me feel relaxed and restored, and finishing a sketch always gives me a sense of purpose and achievement, even if the rest of my day has gone to shit! But I always FEEL more like ‘me’ when I draw with my left-hand – more like the creative child I am deep down. It makes me laugh and reminds me how much fun it is to lose control and just play around, without any sense of fear or expectation. It also takes the pressure off creating something impressive: after all, how can it be any ‘good’ when I’m doing it with my ‘wrong’ hand?!

As well as being a great form of meditation and boost our mental health, non-dominant hand drawing is a wonderful form of self-reflection and reminder of who we truly are. A reminder that it’s GOOD to lose control and just give in to the playful joy of the creative process - without worrying about the end result. Ultimately, it proves that we can find more truth and originality within ourselves (and our artwork) when we lose control and stop trying to hard to find it!

So that’s why I’ve set this challenge for World Mental Health Day: because I’d love you to see all your faces and for you to experience the GUARANTEED JOY of non-dominant drawing!

Go on, dare ya!