The 100 Day Project
creating a sustainable art practice
You may or may not have heard of the 100 day project, but it is a wonderfully simple idea to encourage creativity.
Originally it was the brainchild of a Yale graphic design professor Michael Bierut. As a personal project he had been drawing something each day as a response to an image in that day’s New York Times. In 2006 he decided to take this idea of a daily creative act and he used it to set a project for his design students, giving them the task to choose a design operation to repeat every day for 100 days. They could do anything they wished but the only constraint was this it had to be repeated in one form or another every day and it should be documented so that it could be presented in class at the end of the 100 day period. He repeated this each year until 2011 with great results and some fascinating creative projects, some of which you can find via the link below.
In 2014 the project was adopted by artist Elle Luna and some of her friends, who committed to 100 days of a daily creative act, and they documented and shared their process on Instagram with the hashtag #the100dayproject. She was joined three years later by Lindsay Jean Thompson who now co-hosts the project and before long the idea had spread worldwide. Each year thousands of people now join in with this annual creative challenge.
It is such a simple idea, it’s easy to participate and yet it can have the most amazing results. Best of all, although there are thousands participating, each project is unique and personal to the person doing it. Unlike other online challenges where everyone is guided by a shared process often working to identical prompts, this is totally self-guided. It allows you to establish a daily creative habit, it is a chance to practise or learn a new skill, possibly even create a whole new body of work and the only limit is your imagination.
The rules are simple: you pick a creative project (more on that later), you stick at it every day for 100 days from the start date (This year it is Sunday February 18th - a week from today) and you share it on Instagram with the shared hashtag #the100dayproject. You can also sign up to the
newsletter which gives regular prompts and encouragement, although that is optional. If you are not on Instagram you can share it on different social media platforms or if you don’t want to share that’s fine too, after all it’s your project and your rules. There is quite a bit made about the community part of joining in with these projects but personally I think it is a bit over hyped. With so many thousands joining in the chances of individuals being embraced within the larger community or discovered on Instagram are pretty slim and mostly it will only be your existing connections who see what you do. But that is not to underestimate the power of feeling you belong to this huge group of people all doing the same thing, which can be very motivating.
Some of the postcards I made in 2021
I have participated for the past four years with varying success which has been largely down to picking to right project. In 2020 I thought I would make a quick self portrait every day. By day 8 I was pretty bored with looking at my own face and I gave up. The following year I committed to making finished postcard size pieces of art, in any medium and on any subject and that met with more success. There were collages, stitched pieces, portraits, watercolours, pencil drawings and prints. It was fun but it gradually fizzled out after about thirty days or so. Maybe the idea had just run its course, but I think it might not have been specific enough and I was floundering trying to think what to do each day. It was also quite time consuming.
I think the trick to taking part is to set yourself up for success before you start which means picking the right project for you. This might actually be the hardest part. It means being realistic about what you can achieve so it’s no good picking a project that will take you a couple of hours to complete every day. Aim for 10 – 15 minutes and take it from there, preferably at the same time each day and you will be on the right path for success. It might seem obvious, but you also need to choose something that you really want to do. All new projects are exciting when you begin and it’s easy to feel motivated, but by about day eight that motivation starts to wane, (I’m thinking about my self-portraits here) especially if it turns out that it’s something you don’t really want to be doing. It should be fun not a chore! Remember, 100 days is about three months, so you definitely don’t want to be doing something you feel half-hearted about.
So how do you decide on the correct project to sustain you through 100 days? There are three approaches to this and the first to think about is PLAY. Maybe you just want to have some fun so think back to the things you enjoyed doing as a child, something just for the sheer joy of it. The second guiding principle is PRACTISE. Is there something you want to learn or get better at, in which case daily practise over three months is definitely going to yield results. And finally think PROJECT. This might be a long term goal or body of work you wish to achieve and breaking it down into regular daily tasks makes it doable. And none of these are mutually exclusive.
The other thing to remember is that this is not only for visual artists and creativity can take many forms. It might mean a daily writing practice like penning short poems, journaling, finishing a novel, or learning to play a musical instrument, maybe learning a language, creating a garden, trying new recipes, knitting a sweater, crocheting a blanket. The possibilities are endless.
The other helpful bit of advice is to gather your materials in advance and have them to hand. If you are making 100 collages keep a box of coloured papers, scissors and your glue in a box on your desk, if you are crocheting a granny square each day to make a blanket then have a basket of yarn available etc
By 2022 I had a better idea of what I wanted to do. I realised I enjoyed making portraits, but self-portraits not so much. Trying to produce finished pieces of art, even if postcard sized was quite time consuming and so I decided I would work in a small sketchbook in pencils or pens and draw a quick portrait each day, mostly using photographs in magazines or newspapers as my source material. I had a tin of pens and pencils on the coffee table and my sketchbook close to hand. This time I carried on for well over fifty days and I’m not sure why I stopped. That’s not entirely true and I do know. I’m not keen on this daily pressure to keep posting on Instagram, which takes the joy out of it for me, and I felt I had somehow fallen behind, which is utter nonsense. I enjoyed the daily practise and I still keep the same sketchbook to hand, adding to it whenever I see an interesting face I would like to draw.
Eighty one of the 95 finished drawings/paintings from last year
And roll on to this time last year. Without a doubt, portraits are my thing and I have always drawn faces, finding them fascinating in all their beautiful variety. I decided it was time to get serious and commit to improving my observational and portrait drawing skills. So, in 2023 I joined in by making a commitment to myself to draw 100 portraits or ‘amazing faces’ as I named my project, using photographs sent from followers, family and friends from all over the world. I stuck to it religiously never getting bored. There were occasionally days when I didn’t finish a picture but there was never a day when I didn’t draw. Mostly I started in pencil, but soon I introduced pen and coloured crayons, pastels and even watercolour. One or two I turned into paintings. I lost count of where I was in the project and carried on beyond day 100. I made a total of 95 pictures featuring 108 faces, including a dog, a cat and Paddington Bear! There were babies and children, who are really hard to draw, right through to much older people who usually have the most interesting faces. I learned so much about portraiture, but my biggest lesson is we improve rapidly when we practise something every day, whatever we are doing. This was practise makes perfect in action. Not that for one minute I consider I have achieved anything near perfection.
By now I had also discovered oil paint for the first time in my life too and I was painting oil portraits based on some of my drawings, so when an opportunity arose to have an exhibition at a local café and community hub I applied, which has resulted in my first ever solo exhibition of paintings (as opposed to textiles) and this week we held a private view for some of the subjects of the portraits and their friends. It was a lovely happy occasion and it seemed to be well received.
Needless to say I am buzzing with excitement… or at least I would be if I wasn’t laid low with some horrid virus which wasn’t part of my plan. And although having an exhibition was never a target or aim of my 100 day project last year, none of this would have taken place if I hadn’t committed to drawing and painting portraits every day. This is exactly how the 100 day project can lead to amazing outcomes.
Last year was hugely valuable, and it hasn’t put me off drawing faces, in fact just the opposite as there is still so much to learn. I would like to paint more portraits, maybe include more bodies and hands. I would like to be able to draw more from life too rather than relying on photographs. And I would like to explore the use of pattern in the backgrounds or in clothing creating a contrast between realistic faces and geometric elements.
Experimenting with the use of pattern
When I started the draft of this newsletter I wasn’t sure what to pick for my 100 day project this year but I’m now thinking I will go back to a daily sketchbook practice, where I can explore these different elements of portrait making: drawing from life, expanding compositions beyond the face and incorporating pattern. I’m not going to commit to posting daily on Instagram but I will do an occasional post about my progress and it three months’ time I will probably tell you how I got on here too.
It all kicks off next week on 18th February which is day 1. Are you going to be joining in this year? Please do leave a comment and let me know and maybe we can form our own 100 day project community.
It is worth remembering it may take longer that 100 days or you may only follow the project for 50 days. You may not be able to work on consecutive days or you might change your mind about what you are doing and give up or change your project but none of this matters. It is about making a personal commitment to yourself and recognising what is or isn’t working. If you don’t enjoy it you can stop. And like I said, posting on Instagram every day is a chore for me so I don’t do it but if you like doing that, then it’s fine. Most of all, whatever your motive for joining in, ultimately it is about having fun. You may or may not follow what I’m doing on Instagram but let me know if you are following along, as well as joining in and it might give me more incentive to share.
Ooooh, you've got me thinking now! I loved seeing your portraits last year, maybe I could think of something super simple so I can tag along. 100 days does seem a very long time to stick to something but it's always good to at least have a go.