The Art [in] Travel
Mon, August 1, 2011 at 10:42PM 
Before you can decide what to take, you have to decide what type of art you want to do. Before you decide what type of art you want to do, you have to see what is feasible on this particular trip - how much time will we have - where will we work (plane, hotel, relative's house?), how much space we want to take in our suitcases.
To prepare for our trip to Pennsylvania, the kids and I spent a good bit of time deciding and gathering up what art materials and books we'll take. While I sharpened colored pencils, the girls searched for drawing journals that a sharpie wouldn't bleed through, analyzed the pros and cons of various notebooks, discovered long-forgotten projects, and selected a just-right assortment of colored pencils.
Art Materials + Books for a Week on the Road:
My older daughter (11):
- 20 colored pencils
- 6 neon gellyrolls [see All About Gellyrolls for review/details]
- 1 - 9x12" strathmore drawing journal
- 1 - 9x12" lined writing notebook
- 24 ultra-thin sharpies
- handful of papermate flair markers
- 1 - mini-pencil sharpener
- 1 - kid scissors
- Books: Fablehaven, #2, #3, #4 (Mull), Things Unseen (Clements)
My younger daughter (9):
- 2 - 3x5" mini-composition journals
- 1 - 5x8" lined writing journal
- 12 colored pencils
- 2 papermate ball-point pens
- Books: The Lost Hero, The Throne of Fire (Riordan)
Tammy's art materials:
- 1 - 5x8" sketch moleskine journal for notes and drawing
- 1 - 5x8" watercolor moleskine, half full, for drawing
- 2 - travel sets of W&N watercolor half pans [for pix of my watercolor set-up see Simplicity + Watercolors]
- 1 - pentel aqua brush [found this at a craft store; similar to the Niji Waterbrush
]
- 1 - mini paintbrush
- 3 - extra super fine black pitt pens (I lose pens)
- 15 - sakura gellyrolls
- Books: Gorky Park + Polar Star (Smith), Lettering & Type (Willin), The Art Journal Workshop
(Traci Bunkers)
I'm so excited that I bought rolling luggage! I've had a rolling carry-on since my corporate traveling days but it was time to invest in some checkable stuff too. After much research I got a High Sierra 25"
Read about the art materials we took on our three week, 4 country european adventure.
Check out Silky Hart's collection of posts on the Delights of Traveling.
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Reader Comments (5)
Tammy, thanks so much for mentioning my blog post, Delights of Traveling. Your post was most helpful as I'm contemplating which art supplies to take to Europe. And, may I just say how much I adore and love your site which is truly a treasure chest of creative wonders! Cheers, Silky
Fun supplies to play with. I was in Europe for 2 weeks and limited my supplies to a set of watercolour, an aquabrush, a fine and a medium marker (black), an HB pencil, a glue stick and a mini stapler. You can see the results in my latest ICADs.
Have a safe trip.
Sophie
I've just come back from a trip to Bath and i took a very limited art supply 'purse' (actually a tolietry roll) with an envelope of scrap papers and photos i fancied playing with, watercolour pencils, a few key colour marker pens and stickers but i didnt find a single second to do anything. Not a thing. We were always doing something, eating or sleeping. The only time i managed to do something creative was to draw a picture of the Roman Baths on a postcard on the last day and posted that back to myself. I think that's as good as it will get for us unless my daughter gets crafty as she gets older and wants to join in. Until then i think im going to write and draw on postcards, send them back home and use them in other ways later on.
Can you believe I forgot my watercolors and brushes?
But I've got my camera!
Tammy
I just found your blog this afternoon, and thought I'd leave a comment! I look forward to exploring your site more. I also do art journaling, and have two daughters (mine are 6 & 9). Your post reminded me of when we travel. We must all pack our must have art supplies. :-)