Illustrating Inktober

October is a month full of colorful leaves, pumpkins, cozy clothing, spooky decor, and best of all, Inktober. Inktober is a daily art challenge posted to blogs and various social platforms, a big one being Instagram, using the #Inktober hashtag every October. With new prompts for each day of October, the challenge is to get artists to practice consistently with inking and creativity. 

The founder of Inktober, Jake Parker, is an artist and also one of the founders of SVSLearn, an online resource for artists. He began this challenge in 2009, modeling it after other month-long challenges he saw fellow artists do. He started with the intent to better his skills at inking. He’d post his art to his blog every day, and throughout the years, as he continued, other artists joined in on the challenge. As social media bloomed and sharing art got easier, Inktober grew, becoming the fun trend it is today.

The first seven years of Inktober had no prompt; it was entirely up to artists to ink whatever they wanted. In 2016, the first official list of prompts was released, and since then, the prompt list has become fundamental to the challenge. With anticipation awaiting the release of it days before October starts, giving artists time to think about what they’d do for each day.

Beginner to advanced artists can participate, something highlighted in the words you see on the front page of Inktober’s website, “Anyone can do Inktober; just pick up a pen and start drawing.” While the challenge has rules, they’re relatively flexible; the main points are: making art, inking it, and sharing it (on social media or to a friend). As long as you’re consistent with it, you’re doing Inktober.

Here at Blake, Inktober is also important to students and teachers in art classes. One of these teachers is Mr. Wieman, a talented and enthusiastic artist and teacher. 

“How often do you do Inktober?” I asked him first.

“I try to personally do it [Inktober] every year. But some years are more successful than others…. I started to get the kids to try and join it and try to create that little community so that if one of us slacks off, we can tell them no, no, come on, catch back up.” he responded. 

 “Oh yeah, I do that same sort of thing with my friends. Next, what attracted you to do it?” 

“[Art] teachers always promote draw, draw, draw, and that’s hard to do, right, because it’s an exercise… and then you sit there you have this brand new sketchbook, and I don’t know what to draw. Ideas are hard to come up with. So when this [Inktober] started, it’s like, oh, yeah, I can at least do it for a month and flex that muscle.”

“Lastly, How do you connect it to your classes?”

“I’ve tried it before where we do it as an optional homework. I have an Inktober challenge this year, so if anybody shows me their 31 drawings on November first, Then I have a decent art-related prize.” He replied, concluding the interview.

Drawing every day is hard, but for beginners and advanced artists, flexing that muscle is important and Inktober is one of many things to help out. It gives you a reason to draw and even gives you a prompt. So, pick up a pen, and start drawing. Inktober’s pretty fun!