By golly, this daily sketch thing is very – pleasant. I feel more energized about my practice even on the days when I get home from work, it’s dark and the last thing I feel like doing is drawing. I do it anyway. Because I’m accountable. To another artist who’s doing the same. While I’m still in Officeland, this kind of practice keeps me sane (or reasonably close to it, anyway).
Today, I met up with the Urban Sketchers in Mount Pleasant and did two fast sketches. For the first one I went outside. It was wet-ish, chilly and slightly rainy and water drops kept diluting the ink in my pen. Then, while trying to erase some weak pencil lines, my drawing went a little smudgy. What a mess! I’m posting it anyway. For the 2nd one I was on the third floor at the Mount Pleasant Community Centre. This one is also a wee bit messy, but – who cares! The urban sketchers who got together today have posted their work here if you want to take a look. It’s such an interesting neighbourhood but it’s under threat from development now that the subway is going in. I hope that it retains its character and its old buildings – some of them anyway.
When asked to do a few quick flower drawings for a craft project, the assumption was (by a family member) I could just “whip them off”, no problem. But – Problem!! I just don’t “practice” enough. It took me ages to do anything I liked. And maybe that’s the problem. I’m pretty sure I could actually “whip something up”, but would I like it? And would I want it to be used in a craft project? Of course not. So, after having produced some unsatisfactory little paintings/drawings, here are the ones that made the cut. (OK, one is actually a photo enhanced in photoshop, but I did like it…)
Just FYI, these will ultimately become little fridge magnets.
Work continues on the children’s book. Like the previous one, I’m using photoshop to “paint” the pages. I’m still having a problem finalizing the main character though. I’ve done many colour iterations of “Starling” and am still not happy. Here’s one of the characters I’m more satisfied with (a woodpecker) although no doubt there will be more tweaks (in fact, I can see something I want to change right now):
Painting-wise, I’ve finished a little landscape. I bought a bunch of small canvases and decided that if I was going to fit painting in along with the daily grind and progress on the book, I was going to have to paint quickly and fast. I allotted myself an hour or so and managed to paint a landscape that was mostly satisfying. I left it on the wall for a week then took another half hour or so to tweak it. I’ve got 4 more 10″ x 20″ canvases to “play” with and took the leftover paint from this one and slapped it on a new canvas. Interestingly, it looks as if another landscape is emerging. This is quick landscape #1:
“Early Morning in the Valley” Acrylic on canvas, 10×20″
Crossing back and forth across the Fraser over the past several months gave me many views of the moods of water. I started a painting quite a while ago about the view and the river, and now I think it’s done.
“Big River”, Acrylic Painting, 35″ x 27″
With all endings, there are new beginnings. Work on the next children’s book is starting up again. Here’s a little preview:
They’re looking and listening to something…what could it be?
A third painting based on my meanderings around Caulfeild Park has finally made an appearance on a much-worked canvas. There are probably 3 or 4 (or more) painting attempts beneath the final image. I don’t think painters are supposed to admit this (Painting Rules Manual, Item #467: ‘Painting over old paintings is Bad’) but I have a thing about waste and having endless canvases around with bad paintings on them. I rather like the texture that resulted from my do-over process anyway.
Caulfeild 3, acrylic, 24″ x 12″
On the drawing side, I did my own little urban (rural?) sketch at Southlands Farm in July. Farm animals are charming. Even the pigs were cute. I’ll draw them next time.
