Huevember: My first impressions and insights

 

Nov 6, attempting hex #EA7800 and #E65D00 - A quick nod to a certain Stevie Wonder album I've always cherished



This November, I dove into my very first Huevember challenge. I loved the rhythm of it. Something about waking up, meeting the hue of the day, and seeing what could emerge. It felt gradual, organic and instinctive.

But the part that caught me off-guard was the community- or rather, the lack of one.

Huevember is supposed to be a shared challenge, (right?) A hashtag party and a month-long of, “Hey, look what I made too!”

I noticed it early on. Not just that my posts weren’t getting much engagement, but that everyone’s Huevember pieces seemed to be floating in the same lonely algorithm. I’d scroll the hashtags (#Huevember2025 and #HuevemberDay1 for example) and see gorgeous work from artists I didn’t know, and their posts were sitting there with two likes, maybe four. Little comments. Sparse conversation. Just color after color posted into the void.

It made the contrast with something like Inktober feel huge. Inktober rolls in like a block party. Ink flying, people hyping each other up, folks checking in on each other’s progress. There’s noise, momentum, and community energy.

Huevember… wasn’t that.

And maybe this is just an artist’s hunch, but I’m running with it: I think some of the difference between Inktober and Huevember comes down to the tools themselves.

Inktober literally pushes you toward ink- your actual hand meeting actual paper. There’s something about that tactile messiness, the scratch of the nib, the marks and smudges that refuse to erase(!) that pulls people together. And I think audiences respond to that.

Huevember, on the other hand, leans digital- at least from what I saw this year. So many pieces were clearly created on iPads or tablets, and while they were gorgeous, it gave the whole challenge a different energy. Digital art is brilliant, innovative, and absolutely valid. Some of the most breathtaking pieces I’ve seen exist purely in pixels. But it lives in a slightly different ecosystem. Maybe people assume the work “comes easier” on a tablet (even though that’s not always true), or maybe the emotional distance of a screen-to-screen medium just creates less of an urge to comment, cheer, or gather?

I’m not knocking the tech- I use digital tools myself and love them (have I not been using this e-blog for a few years now, for example?!)  But I do think the medium shapes the community. Inktober feels like ink-stained fingers and shared chaos. Huevember felt more like individual artists tucked into their own digital studios, creating beautiful things for themselves first, and the public second.

It’s just a theory, but it’s one that made the whole experience click into place for me.

Below are my favorite pieces from my first Huevember this year xo



Nov. 18, attempting Hex #0A36FF - replicating Cyndi Lauper's 1983 "She's So Unusual" album. Wanted to make it look like a child made this- probably because I was 6 when this album came out and dad bought it for both me and Mom  



Nov. 15, attempting Hex #620088 - I wrote the “Purple Haze” lyrics first, then applied the acrylics which started to blur what I wrote and I regretted not doing the paint first. But then I figured that it was good this way after all since I was going for that hazy look in the first place! My 💜 to Jimi 🎸



Nov. 4- attempting Hex #edb002 - Had fun with this surreal beehive 


Nov 16, attempting Hex #47018F - A flowery zentangle from @vashaa.art


Nov 28, attempting hex #6CFE13 and #9CFF13, with the complementary hue #6300EC. Pizzazz from The Misfits- from Jem and the Holograms
 
my Instagram channel: https://www.instagram.com/candicecorner77/

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