I'm looking for an individual or a group who'd be interested in taking up an art challenge for (some part of) 2010. Anything from eye-a-day-for-the-whole-year to "let's paint 4 Shetlands in March" is fine!
Primarily I'm looking for an equine art challenge but I might take up (an)other(s) as well. You don't have to be the greatest equine painter since Stubbs (I for one, clearly, am not) or even have any prior experience in drawing or painting horses. Your style doesn't really matter either, be it unicorns or My Little Ponies, Spirit or photorealism.

Your current medium doesn't matter either, unless we agree on something specific (I'm open to ideas). However, I'm primarily looking for 2-D artist who paints or draws (digital or traditional). Textile artist or something similar is fine by me as well, but I stick to pens, papers, paints and canvases. Let's just say "no manipulations or photography or sculpture or jewellery" and be done with it, eh?

The resulting work can be as small as a stamp or as large as a sky scraper wall. It can be a sketch or full-blown work of art, it really doesn't matter to me. Of course, we can agree on something specific as well.

This is NOT a competition but rather an incentive to do (more) art, learn and try different things.

The purpose of this challenge is to provide
- specific ideas for drawing/painting at all times
- enough pressure to stop whining and start doing (though whining is a key part)
- lots of exercise (and thus opportunities for improvement)
- chance to try something you wouldn't normally try
- large amounts of fun!

I realise sometimes life gets in the way of getting things done (or sometimes you just don't feel like doing stuff). This challenge is not going to be too strict, all is required is to commit to making an effort! Failure is always an option. But if you succeed, you have a nice set of pictures to look at.

If you're interested, contact me and we'll discuss it more. You can also look at my gallery and the "50 breeds in 2009" folder to get an idea what kind of stuff I've done with this year's challenge and how rigidly I stick to it...

My artistic development depends on YOU!

Even if this is not your thing, I'd appreciate if you could spread the word.



Suggestions, examples and misc info below this line.
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Example of how the "50 breeds in 2009" challenge has improved my productivity and how it has helped my artistic growth:
2008: 4 finished traditional paintings, 2 WIPs, no experimentation with mediums or palettes
2009: (this far) 12 finished traditional paintings, 22 WIPs, 5 new palettes, 1 new medium and mixed media work

Possible ideas for challenges:
- an equine/horse breed for each alphabet
- virtual pARTY with a new topic every fortnight (in pARTYs everybody uses the same reference/image on which to base their paintings) <-- I'd really love to do this one!
- a horse colour a month
- 52 famous horses
- 6 South-African animals
- 30 ACEOs of American horse breeds
- six horses in watercolour during May
- a 2-hour speed painting every two weeks
- six paintings of Clydesdales using a palette of white, black and yellow

Generally a longer challenge with slower pace (like 1 painting a month for the whole year or one a week for three months) or short spurts of "picture-a-day" (like a week of daily art) are more to my liking.
Of course we could use the tried-and-tested way of making a list and setting a time frame in which to try and complete the list in its entity at the pace that's best suited to one's other commitments (like "50 in a year") instead of "1 a week for 50 consecutive weeks".

When making a list, I think the best way is to let every participant to come up with an equal number of items. That way the challenge should have at least some things you really want and know how to do but at the same time it should have some things you hadn't thought of, or dared to try, before.