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July 11-12, 2026

International Festival of Travel Sketchbooks

Edmonds, Washington (USA)

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Dominika Wróblewska

Dominika Wróblewska is a freelance illustrator based in Gdańsk, Poland, specializing in reportage illustration and writing. A keen observer of the world around her, Wróblewska is fascinated by the idea of drawing as a form of sport, pushing the limits of where a drawing can be made. A good example is her long-term project capturing those who meander through subterranean cave systems. Wróblewska’s illustrated reporting of farmers' protests and the winter swimming culture in Poland was recently published in On the Spot. She is also one of the artists featured in “Reportage Drawing,” a seminal book on the subject by Irish-American author and academic Louis Netter.

Mário Linhares

Mário Linhares likes to link art with community projects. In drawing, he enjoys embedding influences from the masters of the past and learning how those methods and techniques can be used nowadays. Linhares has a B.A. in Design, an M.A. in Visual Arts Education and a Ph.D. in Fine Arts, with specialty in Drawing. A professor in Lisbon, he belongs to the Fine Arts Research Center and Studies at the University of Lisbon. Linhares started Urban Sketchers Portugal in 2009, joined the international executive board in 2011 and served as the nonprofit’s education director until 2019. Linhares is the author of several books, articles and essays, contributes drawings to exhibitions and delivers lectures worldwide.

Lapin

Lapin is a French artist living in Barcelona. He has filled more than 220 sketchbooks over the last 20 years and published more than 50 books. A self-described mobile illustrator, he draws with fineliners and watercolor on custom sketchbooks bound with ledger paper from vintage accounting books. He draws from direct observation, quickly and precisely, depicting his surroundings, the people he meets and the places he’s visiting. Lapin has participated in the Urban Sketchers community since its creation. He teaches the art of sketching at Elisava University in Barcelona and was nominated as an official air and space painter of the French Air Force in 2019.

Nishant Jain

Nishant Jain’s sketching journey began as an immigrant in North America, walking around with a sketchbook to better understand his new world. His work fulfills a curiosity for urban life, and the public spaces that enable us to coexist in harmony. He shares his art in a weekly newsletter to thousands of readers around the world, and is the host of the SneakyArt Podcast. Nishant just finished writing his first book, “Make (Sneaky) Art,” which releases in September. He lives in Vancouver (Canada) with his wife and toddler.

Marielle Durand

Belgian-born artist and author Marielle Durand has been following her guiding principle of drawing on location for over 25 years. She likes to capture the beauty behind ordinary and extraordinary moments, whether she is exploring the Algerian Desert, visiting the Auvergne region or strolling around her Parisian neighborhood. Since 2022, she has belonged to a small group of artists invited to draw the political debates inside the French Parliament. A series of watercolors Durand painted on the spot at the Paris 2024 Olympic Games were recently exhibited at Art-Maniak Gallery in Paris and are the subject of her most recent book “Paris Jeux t’aime.”

Cyrille Briand

Cyrille Briand is a sketcher, watercolor painter and illustrator, living on the Atlantic French coast. He is the author of “Carnet de l’Estuaire,” a travel sketchbook showcasing both tourist and industrial sites along the Loire River delta, and “4 Islands Sketchbook,” about his trips to Corsica, Rhodes, Iceland and Hawaii. Briand joined the Urban Sketchers community in 2017 and founded a local Urban Sketchers chapter for the Saint-Nazaire region in 2019. He teaches workshops focused on outdoor sketching in watercolor. An avid traveler, he looks forward to every trip so he can return home with a new sketchbook full of colorful impressions.

Meet the Guest Artists coming to Sketcher Fest 2025

March 3, 2025 Today we are pleased to announce a stellar roster of international, national and local artists who will be coming to our travel sketchbook festival in Edmonds, Washington, July 19-20. Ticket sales information, a schedule of workshops and…

Art as an Opportunity

When I injured my drawing hand in New York a few years ago; when I sketched around my Paris neighborhood during the pandemic lockdown; or when I almost burned out recording all sorts of sporting events at the recent Olympic…

Channeling Van Gogh

In this workshop, we will analyze Vincent Van Gogh’s drawings and learn his technique of filling up the page with multiple sizes of line strokes to create a drawing like a painting. We will start with a short presentation of…

Exploring Themes with Sketch Collections

What’s possible when we go beyond single sketches and create a series or collection? I’ll share art from my street-themed projects and artists residencies, and discuss my process, including the benefits of setting boundaries, choosing subject matter, and working within…

Sketching Along the Loire River Delta

I started a sketchbook for the simple pleasure of painting the beaches, industrial sites and natural environment near my home in Pornichet, a charming small town on the Atlantic coast of France. Soon, my watercolor sketches revealed a fascinating landscape…

Long-form Reportage

Learn the step-by-step process of developing an idea for a long form or interview-based reportage project into a transcribed script, working through thumbnails, sketches, inked pages, finals, all the way up to finding and pitching your reportage project to publications.…

Drawing After Naptime

Traveling as a young parent is hard enough. Making time to sketch while traveling is harder. In this talk, I share sketches from my trip to see family in India, and the ideas and techniques that helped me keep drawing…

Drawing with a Mission

My own inner voice has been very clear: I never saw myself as Monet in the studio; I wanted to be Anthony Bourdain with a sketchbook. The mission was never to create beautiful drawings or to fill a record number…