"Discover Art" Bookazine to launch next month

The front cover of the first edition
of Discover Art

Next month, some of you are going to be seeing and hearing about the launch of a new publication called 'Discover Art'.

This is a new magazine for artists.  Technically it's actually called a bookazine - which is a magazine big enough to rate as a book!

The other big difference is that the majority of its distribution will be digital - of which more later!

James Hobbs, who's a very experienced editor of art magazines and a fellow Urban Sketcher in London, is editing 'Discover Art'.

I'm sold on the idea behind this new publication as it aims to go beyond some of the more simplistic how‐to formulas and rules of how to copy somebody else's style which all too often fill magazines.

Instead I understand Discover Art will be aiming to help and support artists to find their own creativity and distinctive and personal way of working through experimentation and experience.  So it's not so much how to produce art like a well known artist so much as how to produce art that is unique to you!  I'm definitely in support of that!

Features in the first edition include an article by me..... :)

Its features include

• in‐depth, inspiring looks at paintings by accomplished artists using watercolour, acrylic, oils and coloured pencils, as well as digital media, such as iPads

• interviews and profiles of successful artists including this year's BP Portrait Award winner, Susanne du Toit,

• how a blog and social media can help readers share and promote their paintings and drawings online

• how to meet like‐minded artists through art clubs, societies and sketchcrawls

• information about leading art materials to try out

• a look behind the scenes into the studios and work spaces of artists

• help in choosing the perfect painting holiday

• how selecting the right frame can be the crowning moment of any work of art

• a resources guide to help in finding art courses, exhibition opportunities and ongoing support

Mine is the article with the title "How social media can help the artist".  (I've just signed off the final version!). The main challenge was containing it to the word limit I was given as this is a topic which I could write a book about!

I'm very encouraged by seeing the websites and some of the art of the artists involved. The first edition of Discover Art will also include articles by

• Lucy Duke and Joe Dowden on watercolour, 
• Thomas Doran and Iain Holman on oils, 
• Anne Davies on acrylics - I love the look of her website!
• Rachel Munn on coloured pencils. I was absolutely raving about Rachel Munn's botanical art in pencil only last month at the Florum exhibition in Kent - see Florum 10th Anniversary Exhibition - review - drooling might be more accurate - so I can't wait to see what she has to say about working with coloured pencils.  
• Susan Murtaugh on iPad art. I'm also really looking forward to reading Susan Murtagh's article as she produces some really great digital art - and she's already been been profiled by that well known talent spotter Charley Parker of Lines and Colors!

Copies of the launch issue are set to be well in excess of 100,000.  It will be circulated as both a digital copy to databases of practising artists and will also be available in print via WHSmith, Martin McColl, Easons and key art shows throughout the year.  If you are on the GreatArt database you have no worries - a copy will be on its way to you next month.

There's also another bit about me in this magazine - but I won't spoil the surprise and will tell you about that one after the launch!