Sketch Series: Ruthie Chen

Logo brainstorm for a friend's medical company - Communiclear was a working name

"The Kiss" (1880-1881), Auguste Rodin at the Baltimore Museum of Art

"Bather Fixing Her Hair" (1930), Aristide Maillol at the Baltimore Museum of Art

Profile Template_RUTHIE

Ruthie Chen has a notebook for each side of her brain - one for meticulous note-taking and list-making, and one for more free-form journaling and sketching. "I go back and forth between using design as a mode of expression and communication, which are two different things," Ruthie says. "All design, art, and writing contains aspects of both, but you should always ask who your audience is - the answer should rarely be 'myself.'" In this Sketch Series installment, we asked the Houston-based Marketing Assistant how she strikes a balance between the two. How did you first get into sketching/drawing?I used to hoard notebooks, scribbling or writing in the first few pages before tossing one aside for another – my childhood room is still littered with them. I started journaling regularly right before middle school, but I didn’t start keeping a sketchbook until my high school art classes required one.These days, I have two notebooks – a daily planner for work that I use to keep track of to-do lists, appointments, and meetings, and a personal sketchbook. I find that I go through spurts with my sketchbooks. I’m so used to recording visual information with my phone first that capturing a moment on paper seems almost counter intuitive at times, even if the process of doing so is ultimately the most authentic way to commit something to memory. To be honest, sketchbooks feel intimidating to me; I’m precious to a fault about what goes on the page and tend to overthink things. As a result, my sketches often lack a certain spontaneity and freshness, something I am slowly trying to overcome.Tell us about your drawings.Many of the pages in my sketchbook are a combination of words and visuals, which I think reflects how my brain works. Mostly, they’re a reflection of what’s around or in front of me at the time. I’m still in the imitative stages of capturing things visually – meaning, I can copy from a photograph or draw from life, but I can’t conjure images from my mind without a concrete visual reference. For instance, I tend to record my dreams verbally because I find that, vivid as they are, visuals don’t quite do them justice.What do you sketch when you’re not at work?Scenes from travel or day to day life, hand-lettering and typography, and figure drawings. I like to take a sketchbook with me when I travel – it forces me to take the time to document new sights and sounds that I wouldn’t have otherwise noticed.In terms of hand-lettering, I follow a lot of typography and design accounts on Instagram which are endless sources of inspiration. I’ve recently been interested in monogram logos – in the way the same letterforms can be manipulated over and over again to create vastly different effects, almost like a mini optical illusion. There’s so much you can do with the negative space between forms or the perspective to make something clever and visually arresting.I’ve always loved drawing the human figure – during my first figure-drawing exercise in high school, my teacher instructed us not to take our eyes off of the model or our pens off of the paper. It was a true lesson in abstracting forms and learning to draw what you really see, not what you think you see. The female form, in particular, is interesting to capture because it carries so much historical and cultural weight - the body is both personal and political.What was the last thing that inspired you?A close friend lent me a copy of Private Citizens by Tony Tulathimutte. The novel follows four twentysomethings in millennial San Francisco as they navigate their careers and relationships. The writer's observations are so sharp and darkly witty - one in particular stood out to me: "Cities that tolerate everything tolerate mediocrity."What are your favorite tools?For taking notes and drawing, I love MUJI Gel-Ink Ballpoint Pens in 0.38mm or 0.5mm. I have them in every color. I am a meticulous note-taker, probably some sort of deeply ingrained habit from school, and the MUJI pens allow me to write quickly with minimal resistance. When I need to use pencil, I’ve actually grown really fond of the Paper Mate Sharpwriter Mechanical Pencils that we stock in the office. My current sketchbook is a classic hard cover Moleskine with blank pages, but I prefer the soft cover with dotted grid pages. Once in a blue moon, when I’m feeling ambitious, I like drawing with charcoal and conte crayon. When do you find the time?Ha - I don't. I try to wake up a few hours early at least once a week to sketch or write - my ideas are the most fresh in the morning.