Drawing Day is a worldwide drawing event encouraging everyone to drop everything and draw for the sake of art. The internet is an open canvas. Help create 1 million drawings online this day and boost online art communities.

When is Drawing Day?
Drawing Day this year is June 07, 2008. Unless otherwise noted, Drawing Day will be the first Saturday of June each year.

What is Drawing Day?
One day a year, the world stops to remember that joy we had when we first picked up a pencil and created our first piece of art - that’s what Drawing Day is all about. The goal for Drawing Day is simple - to create enough drawings to make some noise worldwide for the sake of art. 2008 is the first year of this initiative. The goal this year is to aim for 1 million drawings worldwide.

Why is Drawing Day important?
Illustrators and artists alike often go unappreciated. The creation of art and illustration captured our minds ever since we were children and our parents turned the pages of our first book. These stories came to life via the illustrations that took us to an imaginary world full of inspiration.

Whether you’re a professional illustrator or you just enjoy the occasional scribble, you can give back to the illustration community by drawing on this day. By injecting more and more illustration and art into our community, we are not only showing our appreciation to our fellow artists, but we are spreading awareness of the joy of drawing. It is important that you contribute - Drawing Day will only be a success if we all participate and make some noise. So, please tell your friends and spread the word.

How do I participate?
To join in on this event is simple - as simple as picking up a pencil and drawing. However, the most important part is sharing your art with the world.

In today’s age of technology, the ability to share your art with the world is easier than ever. These are some of the of the best ways to reach a broad audience.

The Disasters of War - (2003) Size: 45 x 59.5 cm - charcoal and pencil on paper

“My art began as a repository for all my negative emotions. I was a perfect, cute little girl in a perfect, cute little suburb in New York and didn’t know what to do with all the dark, fearful shit that was swirling round in my head. If I hadn’t found an outlet, I would have exploded like a firecracker.” - Laurie Lipton

Inspired by the hyper-realistic paintings of the 15th-Century Flemish masters, Laurie Lipton has developed a unique, decidedly painterly graphic technique using a permanent-point pencil. At first glance her drawings look like photographs, upon further inspection many thousands of distinct, precise, cross-hatched pencil-strokes, build up the rich and monochromatic tones. While working exclusively in black and white (“because those are the colours of memories and phantoms” she says) her unsettling and macabre images resonate a slanted psychological realm where rooms are ghost traps filled with yearning souls, secret fears and disturbing memories……

Love Bite - Charcoal and pencil on paper, 137 x 96 cm, 2002

Click here for more info on the artist Laurie Lipton. You might also be interested to read a Beinart interview with Laurie. Follow the jump to see some more of Lipton’s exquisite mastery. more…

Dan Hillier is a London-based artist and the man behind this tentacled fusion of Victorian engraving and Lovecraftian horror. His “Altered Engravings” bring to mind the surreal collages of Max Ernst.

Dan Hillier sells his prints from a stall at London’s The Sunday (Up) Market, but if traveling there is geographically prohibitive, you can purchase prints or commission work using the contact information on Hillier’s Web site.

More of Hillier’s utterly intriguing engravings after the jump. more…

Metal Head, Pencil and Painter IX

Manabu Hassegawa is an illustrator from Japan. His portfolio (mostly) consists of these fantastically drawn and painted female figures, in a style that combines both grotesque and erotic. This charming fusion is accentuated by very personal caricatures and vision. See more after the jump and share your thoughts. more…

Am sure there’s many of you that have seen this image of Christ before. Apparently, it’s “all done with a single stroke of the pen”. The image itself is utterly intriguing and technical mastery, but the real mystery lies in the creator. Does anybody out there know the artist behind this enigmatic portrayal of Christ?

Kentucky Fried Women

Evolve-R is the portfolio and alias of artist Anthony Ventura, from Toronto, Canada. His site consists of fascinating and radical Illustrations, drawings and comic art - all sketched using ink and finished in photoshop. These are drawn and rendered in a very unique and compelling ‘graffitiesque’ style. Most of his illustrations appear aggressive, suggestive, humorous and ironic, while others lean towards the erotic. Anthony’s Clients have included Rolling Stone, Kitchen Sink, CXO Magazine, CIO Communications, SPIN Magazine, Powder Magazine, Bike Magazine, Time Magazine ( Asia), Miami New Times, Ad Age Global, Chicago Tribune and more…

Follow the jump to sample some favorites. more…