Top 5 Drawing Exercises of 2024

The Grown-Ups Table has spoken

Hello my dear GUT peeps.

Real fast before diving in: DrawTogether gear is now available! Perfect for gifting (yourself!) In addition to comfy tee’s we also made mugs and the perfect hat. Get them all here.

TBH, I live in my DrawTogether hat.

Get yours here!

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Alright, let’s do this.

Can you believe it’s December? How did that happen so fast??

Last week we wrapped up our series on drawing gratitude. We put our attention on the little and big things we take for granted, and bolstered our hearts through focusing on what matters. I loved seeing everyone’s drawn celebration of food and family cuisine in last week’s chat. Paying subscribers, check them all out in the chat, and a mini-gallery of GUT artwork is at the bottom of this dispatch just for you.

They are - you are - *chef’s kiss.*

Looking Back

We’re going to dedicate the remaining weeks of 2025 to creative reflection. We’ve learned and drawn so much in the Grown-Ups table over the past year, and don’t want to that to go unappreciated. We need to look back to see how far we’ve come.

We started off 2024 with our wildly successful 30-Day Drawing Habit. We collaborated with the National Gallery of Art (we’ll revisit that next week!), and featured incredible visiting artists like Amy Tan,

Alexander Chee

, Gretchen Rubin, and

Austin Kleon

. We geared up for the election with seven days of art and social engagement including live events with

Carson Ellis

and

Cheryl Strayed

and

Neko Case

and Julia Rothman. We did a series on pencil skills and another on color, and we even gathered together in person to meet and draw. Honestly, I am impressed with us, and so proud of what we’re building here. Thanks again to all you paying subscribers who make it possible. All of this - the lessons, the guests, the series, and my work in general - is only possible because of you.

I’m kicking us off this week by featuring five of our most popular drawing lessons and exercises from the year. I’ve gone ahead and included links to the full lessons (click on the titles) and written out the drawing exercises here for all to enjoy. Paywall be damned. (Thank you subscribers for making this accessible to all!)

If you’ve done these drawing assignments before, GREAT. Every time we use a familiar prompt to create a new drawing it yields wildly different results. Choose one that grabs your imagination and try it again. Consider how your news drawing reflects how you’ve grown and changed since your earlier attempt. Love to see the old and new next to each other in the chat!

What was your favorite lesson and assignment from 2024?

I’m curious to hear what YOUR favorite was from the year? Leave a comment below and let me know which you vote for. I’ll be sure to bring back a riff on it in 2025.

Okay, without further ado, let’s dive into the top five drawing assignments from the year!

TOP 5 ASSIGNMENTS in 2024

1. Judge a Book by It’s Cover

I love this exercise and I am not the only one. In fact, I was delighted to see that THIS was the most-interacted-with exercise of the year. This is also a great one to return to - create a book that reflects where you’re at today, as we close out 2024. Here’s the link to the lesson, and here’s the assignment:

Assignment: Judge a Book by its Cover

First, we need to figure out what we want our fake books to be/say/do… You don’t have to take this seriously. This is fun and simple. Remember anything can be a book - we are just doing covers - all you need is a title and an image. Here are a few prompts to get you going:

1. What is a hard-earned lesson you’ve learned and would like to share?

2. What is your favorite food?

3. Do you have an embarrassing grade school memory you now find funny?

4. What drives you crazy?

5. What is the funniest word you can think of? What image makes NO sense when you put it with that? Try that!

Text

Once you know what your idea is, how would you say that in a fun short, pithy way? Or maybe it’s super long. Or a short title and really long subtitle? Who wrote it? You? Dr. Know It All? A hamster? No rules!

Image

Now that you have the title, what is a fun visual way to express your idea? Think simple, and unexpected. Try to stay away from “see/say” - that’s where what you say and what you see are the same things. Remember when we put words and pictures together, we have a chance to create a third thing, and not just be two of the same things.

Execution

Now use any medium you want for this. Pencil, Pen, Paint, Colored Pencils - this is up to you. Whatever is most fun. How do the text and image fit together on the cover? Try a few different sketches if you want before committing it to ink.

2. Daily Beauty (Or, Garbage Roses)

Drawing is noticing and noticing is drawing. Drawing something from life gives us the opportunity to slow down and look at it closely. This week exercise gave us the opportunity to discover beauty in our every day lives - often in the most unexpected places! You can read the lesson here and the assignment is below. Definitely a fave.

Assignment: Collecting Daily Beauty

We are going to become beauty collectors. Every day this week we are going to find ONE MOMENT OF DAILY BEAUTY, then draw it in our sketchbooks. If you want to write about it, great. Do that on another page. We are going to create a page filled with 6 moments of beauty, full bleed. (On the 7th day we rest, sort of.)

First things first: divide your sketchbook page or spread into 6 spaces.

Now go about your day - and take your sketchbook with you! Or, if you are inside today, start opening your eyes to moments indoors. And starting in the upper left hand section, draw a moment of daily beauty you spot today.

Every day this week we are looking for a daily beauty. A little moment that strikes a resonant chord in our heart. When we see it, draw it in the day’s space. Try to keep your eyes open all day. If you want to make a list of daily beauties you notice, maybe do that on another page, and then decide later which you’ll draw…. You do you. No rules in art.

If you want to use collage or pencil or any medium you like, go for it. What matters most is that we are hunting throughout the day for daily beauties, and celebrating them in our sketchbooks.

On day 7, we can go back and fill in any days we missed and add a title or any text or detail we want that makes the collection feel complete. Sound good? Great!

This was mine on Day 4 - a collection in process.

3. Our Beloved Animals

In reflecting on 2024, I will certainly thinking about my beloved dog Suso who many knew and loved from DrawTogether. She died in May, and her co-mom Caroline and me were so sad, and also so lucky to have been able to love her in this lifetime. Love will break your heart every time. And yet, it’s always worth it.

This lesson, which featured a fun photo collection of artists and their pets, was an opportunity to celebrate the love of an animal in our lives. The assignment was a balm:

Assignment: Your Furry Friend

This week I’m offering us all the opportunity to draw an image of that animal you loved and tell us a little something about them. It doesn’t have be a fancy drawing. It can be a blind contour, or a comic. It can be from a photo or from life or memory or imagination. But draw an animal (or human animal) you’ve loved and would like to remember. And tell us about the silly things your animal/otherwise friend did that made you laugh, or drove you crazy, or how they tool care of you, or how they saved your life.

Because they do.

This assignment is entirely selfish, my friends. I really just want to see drawings of your pets because it will make me feel better. :)

4. Ecstatic Architecture

This fantastic lesson featured the artwork of Edie Fake, an artist living and working in 29 Palms, near the Joshua Tree desert in southern California. His graphic, colorful, decorative paintings and murals imagine queer, fantastical, hopeful architectural spaces he calls “ecstatic architecture.” His hope is these “ecstatic architecture” paintings will trigger the viewers into thinking beyond what is and start to imagine what could be.

In an election year with so much on the line, we have the opportunity to imagine possible futures. Imagining with a pencil on paper goes beyond fantasy and into manifestation. There is power in putting things down with pen. So ask yourself: what would your ideal club house look like? And what world-building action would you take in there? What does it do to your heart to see it sketched out on the page? Maybe it makes it one step closer to reality. Let’s join Edie. Here’s the lesson, and here’s the assignment:

Assignment: Your Ecstatic Architecture

Your drawing assignment this week is to imagine and draw an ecstatic architectural space that celebrates your community.

If you were going to create a space for a community you are proud to be a part of, what would it look like? What community would it be? How would you represent that community in a building? Would it look like a “real” building, or totally surreal, or something else? (No rules in art!) What colors, shapes and lines would you use. Size? Shape? Windows? Doors? Would mediums would you use? Paint? Colored Pencils? Pens? Collage? Chalk on the ground??

This drawing can be any size, any medium, but keep in mind Edie Fake’s “aesthetic of resourcefulness” - let’s work with what we have and consider constraints a gift! Less is often more.

If you want to use text and give your building a name or sign, or write a little about the space you create, go for it. No rules in art.

5. Travel Tips: Less Phone, More Sketchbook

Drawing isn’t just an activity - it’s a way life. So when we’re heading out for a vacation, a family trip, a solo excursion, or even a subway ride, instead of focusing on what tech to bring, let’s shift our thinking towards what art supplies to bring. First and foremost, always bring a sketchbook.

This lesson encouraged all of us to bring a sketchbook with us on our journeys, and I think it’s a good one to remember as we enter the holidays. Instead of scrolling on our phones, grab your sketchbook and memorialize what you’re seeing, thinking, and saying. The things best gone unsaid in a family holiday can be scribbled in a notebook and laughed at, privately, forever. Here’s the lesson, and here’s the assignment:

Assignment: Sketch In Situ

This Holiday Season I want to see us all drawing in our sketchbook for at least a few minutes… while in transit! Do a quick sketch while waiting in any line, waiting for any family member, stuck in highway traffic, taxing on the tarmac, sitting on the subway, walking by ocean/lake/trees…! Then grab that phone and TAKE A PHOTO OF YOURSELF in situ!! (Or, if you don’t want to share a photo of your face, take a pic of your sketchbook in situ, so we all can see where you are drawing.)

If you are *not* traveling, this is an opportunity to practice quick sketches in the in-between moments of your daily life. Notice when you would normally reach for your phone and instead pull out the small sketchbook you tucked into your purse/bag/pocket.

Wherever you are this weekend: substitute a few minutes of phone scrolling with a few minutes of sketching. Take a pic. (Share with us in the chat if you are comfortable.) And then sigh a deep breath of satisfaction.

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Alright friends, that was five of our top Assignments from 2025 - hope you enjoy revisiting one or more of them. Let’s share our drawings in the chat. And if you are revisiting one, I know we’d all love to see it.

See you next week with a very special reflection with the National Gallery of Art !!

xoxo,

w

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Gallery

Deb Murray: Grateful for quick dishes made with simple panty items that can be made for one. I recently discovered this one and have made it twice in one week with variations. As a person that lives alone I can struggle to feed myself well if it takes much time or prep. I know I am worth the effort but often I’d rather spend the time doing other things. This sketch made me so happy to memorialize my new favorite breakfast (using my brand new, shiny red, perfect for one, small casserole dish).

Bruno: San Esteban, Argentina: With only 3 days left of a life-changing 14-month trip in South America, these days are bittersweet for me. So I'm VERY grateful to the plum tree outside my cabin, and to the owner Fernando who *insisted* I use the fruits. They fall down super-ripe. The hard part is not eating them right away. I'm grateful for the welcome comfort they bring... and for the smell of plum-rosemary jam bubbling away as I type

Molly Tenenbaum: Sometimes I add walnuts as well.

Katharine: Inspired by Wendy's picture inspired by Wayne Theiebaud. Porridge is what gets me out of bed in the morning and nourishes me - it's been a true friend through illness and anxiety and huge life changes. I am so grateful for the magic a few oats and some water can make with a bit of time and love.

Henrie(tta) Richer: Channeling Wayne Thiebaud 😊.