A Different Test Of Endurance: 24 Hours Of Drawing The 24 Hours Of Le Mans
Story originally featured on Petrolicious 2017
Everyone you meet who has been to Le Mans for the 24Hr will tell you that there is something special about it that you can’t quite put into words. In 2014, I went to my first Le Mans 24hr as an accredited photographer, blissfully ignorant of the the circuit’s history and only with knowledge that it was an old race with really fast sports cars that could sometime look a bit strange. The weekend ended up being a life changing experience and vowed that I would return every year from then on.
However, only one year later I was left feeling devastated when I was unable to make it to the Circuit De La Sarthe. Determined that I would at least stay up for the full 24hrs on race day, a quick sketch that I had done the day before led me to contemplating a challenge to complete a 24 artworks during the race and share them with like minded fans of motorsport on social media. Hoping to do one artwork per hour, the goal would be to create an edited visual commentary of memorable moments.
Massively underprepared, my first year of #24forLM24 resulted in me running around the house tearing pages out of exercise books while looking for paper to draw on and ending up surrounded the dining table workspace with drawings and watercolours to paintings on canvas.
With 2017 being my third year of #24forLM24, I’d like to think that I’ve somewhat progressed in terms of preparation and direction. Over the last 2 years, experimentation with mediums has ended up with some stressful moments as I struggled to complete artworks. So over the weekend I set up a livestream and armed myself with a thick pad of paper, a multipack of Sharpie’s, markers, pens, pencils and a stash of Redbull.
Every year I find there is a bit of a rhythm. Saturday usually goes by without any problems, but it’s at the turn of the day when fatigue starts to set in and I wonder why we aren’t even halfway yet. Persisting past this, a kick of energy usually follows as the sun begins to rise, by 9am another round of fatigue grips me as I start checking the time constantly to see how much further there is to go. With three hours to go, the action heats up as teams begin jockeying for position before they cross the line at full sprint.
Without a doubt, this year’s Le Mans 24Hr will go down as one of the most memorable in history and a true representation of what the race is all about. From heartbreak to ecstatic joy, bumper to bumper racing with teams battling against one another as well as their own machines, Le Mans truly is a special race. With many more editions ahead, I’m going to make a new promise - to complete #24forLM24 every year and hopefully one day at Le Mans.