Cam Valley Arts Trail Group artists, Gina Belford, Gaynor Leverett-Jaques and Karen George have all signed up to take part in an international art project: The Sketchbook Project, hosted by Brooklyn Art Library, New York.

Each artist will be filling a 5 x 7” sketchbook and then returning it to the library where it will be photographed and then made available to see online later in the year.

Brooklyn Art Library holds the world’s largest collection of artist sketchbooks, with over 50,000 sketchbooks from 30,000 different global creative people, and each year they invite artists to add to the collection as part of The Sketchbook Project.

Registration for the project is open until June and anyone can take part. For more information see: https://brooklynartlibrary.org/participate

Gina is going to use her sketchbook to explore combining her paintings with her late grandfather’s poetry. He was a quiet man but wrote hundreds of very funny and poignant poems, which remain

unpublished.

Gina says: “I love the thought of him looking down and seeing our two artistic talents become one – it would make him smile.”

Gaynor intends to explore ‘mark making’, collage and colour with mixed media in her sketchbook. Seeing this as an opportunity to experiment and explore the emotions of the final weeks of lockdown in England.

“Emotions are at an all time high, nerves, hopes and fears all coming to the fore.

“I’d like to hope the sketchbook reflects a line in the sand as we step forward positively,” she says.

Whereas Karen has decided to capture High Littleton, where she lives, in sketches.

“I thought it’d be a great way to share the village with the world, as well as supporting this fabulous international resource.”

For more information about how the artists are tackling the project, head over to: www.camvalleyartstrail.co.uk