About Julien

 

My name is Julien Renwick (b. 1989), I’m a self-taught artist, born in Canada and now living in Australia. My abstract works consist of fine-liner pens, writing ink, gouache, and watercolour (digital and physical), with current subjects focusing on neuroanatomy, fairy tales, and meaningful landscapes from my travels. 

Like most kids, I loved to draw and remember the deep joy it created in me. Not to last, this joy was marred by my harsh internal critic and a plethora of other anxiety gremlins, all telling me I wasn’t good enough, that I can’t draw, that I was wasting my time. 

Regrettably, I started to believe these voices. I’d draw less and less, yet wish more and more of being able to draw and paint. 

At 24, I moved to New Zealand and later Australia, putting down my roots in Adelaide. The first 5 years living abroad were among the hardest of my life. I was a mix of anxiety, then-unknown trauma, a handful of undiagnosed health conditions, depression, and homesickness. I was stressed and unkind, surviving at 4/10 on most days. 

One step at a time, I found my way out, reclaiming those wounds.

But not through drawing. The inner voice saying I couldn’t draw was too loud and I still believed it.

Until one December day, something in me sparked and I was filled with the overwhelming desire to rewrite my inner narrative.

I was going to learn to draw. I was just going to do it.

Enter "The 100 Day Project." On 30 December 2023, I picked up a 2B pencil and completed a sketch. Then another, then another, then … a hundred. Then 200. Then everyday of 2024, each day, adding to my sketchbooks, building trust in myself. 

Those 100 (now 400+) days transformed my world. When I finished the project in April 2024, I saw myself at an array of younger ages, being hugged tight as he cried. “you will learn to draw, you can do this, you can do hard things, you will find it in yourself to keep at it each day. You are enough.” 

Drawing and painting has invited me to know myself and what I can accomplish. A year of consistent daily practice has evicted the negative internal critique, replacing it with a new voice of kindness and acceptance, allowing me to be more myself. 

And I believed this new voice, full of hope and long-lost joy, for the first time in my life, now able to banish the anxiety gremlins of the past. As I plan to complete 500, 750, or 1000 days of drawing, my mind, body, and heart all agree saying

You will do it and it will be wonderful.

I’m so grateful I picked up that pencil back in December 2023. I’m so glad you’re here, welcome to my gallery. 

Julien Renwick | March 2025