KOREA SKETCHBOOK 2026
I went on an art trip to Seoul and Jeju Island and made a bunch of new friends. Except for Johanna. We were already friends before the trip.
I’m not much of a marker or colored pencils guy but I was pretty happy with how these came out.
I brought my gouache and some canvases but our calendar was so full of activities I didn’t have much time to paint.
I painted under this bridge while everyone else was getting breakfast and going to the art store.
People always stop and chat when I’m painting. It’s pretty fun and it gets me out of my bubble. Everyone who’s ever stopped to say hi is very complimentary.
As I was painting this view of a bridge in Seoul, a lady and her mom were on a walk and they stopped and asked me "Did you come here to paint?" and I said "Yeah I got lost in this neighborhood and I like this bridge"
She said "Are you a traveling artist who has come here to paint Seoul?" and I thought about it for a sec. Nothing she said was wrong I've just never heard it said out loud like that. So I said "yeah I guess so!”
I told her I was here from America to paint Korea with some other artist friends. I told her all the other touristy stuff we had done, mostly just hanbok at the palace. She turned to her mom and said “something something - hanbok” but I feel like her mom wasn’t really listening. She was just happy to be there.
She said “it rained yesterday!” (Probably meaning, what were you doing out in the rain all dressed up!?)
She said "This park hasn't always been so nice. I grew up here and I used to play near the water and my mom would tell me there is a ghost in the water that would drown me if I got too close"
I also bought a disposable camera while I was there but I kept getting my finger in the way.
I tried to do something new with these drawings. I’ve never been much of a markers guy but I was really surprised by how much I enjoyed them. This was also my first time really using colored pencils. I wish the colors blended easier, but I’m happy with how the pencil stayed on the paper and didn’t smudge. The blue pencil sketch of the waterfall is one of my favorites.
I learned I had to do a good amount of mental editing while sketching. I had to suppress the urge to draw everything I saw (I’m not a camera) and instead draw the shapes of the thing. Like a caricature.
I set a goal to fill this sketchbook while I was in Korea, but I ran out of time! I got about half way, I was hoping I’d have more time to draw while I was there but we ran around doing a lot of fun touristy stuff instead.
Shoutout Jackie Droujko and Goodmate Travel for putting this trip together!