This is a preliminary sketch from a photograph I took of Henry on his birthday in November. Instead of having a cake with candles, he wanted to scatter the candles across the whole table. I managed to catch his face in an expression both solemn and thoughtful.
I hope to develop this sketch further, once in graphite and again in watercolor.
For over a year, I have been ruminating over an idea I have for an art quilt. It is inspired by our trip last year to Teddy Roosevelt National Park in North Dakota.
For those not familiar with the park, it is known for what’s called the Badlands. These are sedimentary rock formations that have been eroded away, displaying the different layers almost like a layer cake.
Here is an example of what I’m talking about.
The timing and circumstances of the trip were counter-productive to getting any good photographs. It was high noon in mid-July. I had no idea how hot it could be in North Dakota during the summer. To compound things, the whole western edge of the United States was on fire last year. We were about a thousand miles away from the smoke and yet haze covered the entire sky and dampened the light. Nearly all the color was washed out of the scenery. No shadows. No highlights.
Here is my best photograph in the park that day.
To get a suitable reference photo of the overlook, I resorted to the Internet. This photo was taken by Mike Hanson. It is 2017 and it must be a sunset view.
Bill added the segmenting lines so that I could scale it up to size I wanted. Using the grid method, I transferred the major shapes to paper and sketched a value study.
Very well pleased with the result, I moved on to the fun stuff: selecting a color scheme and swatching it out in watercolor. I chose a split complementary scheme focused on orange, with blue-violet and blue-green as the complements.
Now my creative juices are flowing. I’m excited to pick out some fabrics and start painting them!
Quick pencil sketch of Lu studying her shadow on the beach.
Refined and blended shadow, added color.
Last Saturday, I was wanting to just mess around with mark-making in my sketchbook. As I opened my pen case, I spied a dip pen that I had purchased, but never really used. Grabbing a bottle of Sumi ink, I got busy. It was fun! After I had marked up the paper quite a bit, I added some watercolor crayon for color, and spritzed water on sections.
That exercise left me warmed up and wanting to do more. I turned to this photograph of Mogadore reservoir that I had taken while visiting Ohio in November of 2020.
After blocking the scene in pencil, I used watercolors to paint the background. The dip pen and ink came into use for the foreground branches.
This little 4 x 6 painting will be a nice postcard to send home.
Celebrating those who stand up and stay engaged.
Thank you Bob, Bill and Cobie.
Pigma Micron pen on Arches cold press paper, with Prussian blue, burnt sienna, transparent orange, new gamboge and Dr Ph Martin bleed proof white.
Daily Fiber 