Wednesday Art Blogging

This is another urban sketch of mine, from before I'd heard of Urban Sketchers.

A nickel to any local reader who can name the place in the sketch.






Peace.

More Drawings About Buildings

View out a New York Window
ink and watercolor pencil

Crackerbarrel Alley, Northampton
watercolor pencil

Shelburne Falls
watercolor pencil

I have become addicted to the Urban Sketchers blog. Inspired by the art I see there, I pitched an idea at the elementary school to teach an Urban Sketchers class to third through fifth graders for the Spring term. I am so happy they approved it! And that some kids signed up! I have been scouting local locations -- to which the students and I will walk each week to sketch. I have also been looking at some of my sketches of buildings and city scenes from my sketchbooks. 

In addition to the Urban Sketchers class, I will be teaching a Drawing from Life class to third through fifth graders, and an Intro to Making Comics class to kindergarten through second graders.

Happy Art! Happy Spring!







Peace.

Schoolyard Sketches, 2

All of these sketches are ink pen drawings, with color pencil added later to the portrait of Adam. I think I need to change my drawing utensils goody bag that I always carry to include some color pencils.

I apologize for the sloppy photographs, someday I'll learn to work the scanner. For now, I just wanted to get these up because it's already a new week for drawing.



Peace.

PTO Meeting & Other Recent Sketches

Schoolyard Sketches

hot day in the schoolyard
pencil and marker on paper

pink balloon
pencil and marker on paper

I am still trying to make a habit of daily drawing by carrying a sketchbook everywhere (and actually taking it out of my bag). Here are a couple of quick sketches I made while the girls played on the playground after school.

Hourly Comics

Update: I colored them! (don't forget you can click on the image to enlarge it for easier reading)...







Online somewhere Sunday I saw someone mention this, and I thought I'd give it a try. It's been a long time since I've drawn comics, and heck, truthfully, I don't think what I used to draw as comics would even be called comics by anyone but me. But that didn't stop me! Have a look (don't forget you can click on the image to enlarge it for easier reading)...











Have a cupcake, I'm going to bed...






Peace.

Winter Is Rolling In

Though only a little snow fell here this weekend, it finally feels like Winter is rolling in.

The cold air felt good on my face this morning as I scraped the ice off the windshield.

Windshield art was born, like many of the things I invented, to console a baby. It probably started back when I needed to keep the baby in view. I would buckle her in her car seat first, then go scrape off the snow and ice. To keep her entertained, I drew pictures in the ice with the scraper.

Now, my 9yo and 7yo, who could play in the yard or wait in the warm house, instead get in the car and watch eagerly for the pictures to emerge as I scrape each window. We are often in a hurry in the morning, and I sometimes think it is silly for me to be drawing, even though it doesn't really take much longer than regular scraping. Then I assure myself that when the girls are grown, they are much more likely to remember that their mother drew pictures in snow and ice than that they were a minute or two late to school from time to time.

What art will you make today? What memory?

Peace.

I am enjoying reading this book

Stop Forgetting to Remember, by Peter Kuper.

When I was looking for some new graphic novels to read a while back, this book passed my thumb-through inspection in the shop, so I bought it. I didn't know what to expect, only having this book from Peter Kuper in my collection. It turns out, Stop Forgetting to Remember, is laugh-out-loud funny. At least for me. At least for now. [Full disclosure: I also find Kafka laugh-out-loud funny.]

I am completely identifying with the main character's trajectory into adulthood (though he did many more drugs than I did) and parenting. This morning, when I could barely drag myself out of bed to get the girls ready for school, I read a few pages describing his new father days, and laughed enough to get up to face the day.

These are the pages that gave me the strength to get out of bed laughing
(it was also a good place to stop, 'cause it's the end of a chapter).

I am enjoying the art, as well. I particularly like recognizing shops and buildings from my New York City days of youth.

I am also thinking of two friends from my community as I read, NTodd and AndyG, who recently became new fathers. I think of their partners, too, of course, ERG and E (yes, I think she has a blog, too, but I can't remember where). It's just that, since the main character in this book is male, the birthing and parenting scenes are from his perspective. Since I'm a single parent, I do both parts (smiley face here). The following two pages, in particular, made me think of the boys.







With all of the daily drawing I'm doing, and all of the graphic novels I've been reading, life has begun to look a lot like a comic book. Here is a little comic relief from my own life from yesterday. No, I don't always ask the girls to help me off with my boots, but I did yesterday, and they were happy to oblige.










Peace.

Habits and Addictions, Routines and Rituals

Was it as I was indulging my habit of wandering and looking around the house as I grind my morning coffee that I looked out the pantry window and saw this view into the garage? Or perhaps it was during the sunny afternoon routine of doing laundry that it caught my eye. Was it addiction that forced me to grab my camera? And what of my ritual of sharing photographs on the blog with you?

In the week without computer, I nearly became addicted to solitaire (the card kind), and reading graphic novels, though I did not become addicted to drawing. Trying to make drawing a daily habit has been very difficult for me. Where does creating art fit in a life committed to taking care of other people, especially when I barely keep up with all the mundane tasks involved in running a household? And how come I can make room for blogging?!

As for the photograph...

The metal angel candle holders are a gift from my mother. She had sent two when my family was two, then she was happy to find and send a third when I had another child. As soon as the seasons turn dark, we add the ritual of lighting candles at the dinner routine.

I found the 7-up bottle at one of my favorite local houses, Grave's Farm, after the brothers Grave had died, but before the house had been renovated and turned into a bed & breakfast, and the land had become part of Mass Audubon. I have a habit of searching for and saving rusty things. I found some rusty buckets and tools along with this soda bottle and some old magazines there on some of my routine bike rides past the farm. I also once drew an ink sketch of the tree out front.

I gave the original drawing to a friend, this is a photograph of a color copy

Whiskey. I'm not sure when I first fell in love with the word (and for me, it always has an 'e'). Perhaps it came from my childhood: there have been addictions in my family (but I managed to escape them). I associate the word not only with country music (it's hard to front a band named Whiskey Ina without being gifted with lots of whiskey--Ooh! I like the double meaning there!), but also poverty and passion, pirates and poets, a black & white movie of a life lived. And, heck, the Knob Creek bottles are cool.

The tea cannisters are from back in the days before the french press came to live here. Before I made coffee at home, I was mostly a tea drinker. I have the bad habit of keeping cannisters and tins, thinking I might use them for something someday. Oh, the many projects that see light only in my mind, more rusty treasures.

The spiderwebs are courtesy of the spiders.

I'm Back!

the flu
pencil on paper, 6x5 inches

I've been gone for a week. And now, just like that, I'm back. All hail mighty electricity.

My old computer cord could not be coaxed into working any longer so I shut the machine down and contemplated my fate. The girls like me better when I have no computer access at home. My books and newspapers like me better, too.

In the mix of contemplation was a household full of flu. In all its swiney-ness, it was mostly just fever and cough. The girls are both better and were back to school today, so I decided it was time to fix the computer.

I had gone to the computer store downtown last Saturday. I had heard they were a bad store, but I decided to try anyway. They had a cord for $70, but if I took it home and it didn't work, they'd charge me a 15% restocking fee to return it. Factor in their less-than-helpful attitude and I left the store empty handed.

This morning, I looked in the phone book for other computer stores. I can't believe, in our hippy groovy town, there isn't a friendly mac store. Perhaps there's one in Amherst. Anyway, I found a listing for a store over the bridge. So there I went. It turned out to be a repair shop (Yeah, I could've called first, but I had other errands I needed to do over the bridge anyway). However unlike the computer store in my town, these folks were very friendly. They suggested I go to the Apple store in the mall (even though I never go to the mall). They assured me the folks there were also very friendly.

Sure enough, they were. At the Apple store, they let me plug in my computer using one of their cords to determine if that was indeed my problem. How delighted I was when the machine came to life, and there I was, still online at my blog (where I had been when it crashed)! I had 205 new emails! My virtual world was still alive!

I bought a new cord, then moseyed down to eyeball all the fancy new machines. I started talking to one of the salespeople and he surprised me by suggesting I keep my old machine, just get out of Panther. He said he would need to know how much memory I had, to see if I could go to Leopard. I asked if we could plug in my machine with my new plug and take a look. We did (I need more memory). He searched online for a place that still sells memory for my machine. He also searched for the (high) cost of Leopard (which we added to my wishlist). The whole time he was talking to me and searching online, he was also using his computer cleaner to clean my machine! It's never had a bath before (don't tell my dad), and gosh, it looks as good as new now.

[Full disclosure: the cord actually cost $79 at the mall, but it was an Apple cord rather than the generic one at the store downtown, if that means anything. I asked if they would charge me a restocking fee if I returned it, and they said they only charge restocking fees for things with serial numbers, like computers, not for cords. Of course, I won't need to return it because they let me try their cord before I bought one to make sure that was my problem!]

It's good to be back. Though I feel guilty that the girls are in the kitchen building a cardboard city and I'm in here reading and writing. Hmm... And contemplating.

Signs

Is a Speed Hump different from a Speed Bump? Why yes, yes it is.

100 in 100, Day 96?

self portrait with cucumber

Yes, I think this is Day 96. I have all kinds of excuses why there was a gap here, near the finish line. The garden harvest is demanding my attention. The girls needed to get ready to go back to school. I'm lazy.

The real reasons are more likely that switching to painting was much harder for me than drawing with pastel, and also that nearing 100 forces me to think about what the heck I'm doing and where I want to go next. So. Of course, I ran away ran away ran away! But I came back! And though I value creating everyday, my realistic goal for this project was to complete 100 works of art in 100 days.

I did number 84 on Tuesday night, and it turned out pretty clunky, so I was discouraged. So I skipped a day, and then, on Thursday, I did numbers 85 through 90. Then today, I did 91 through 95.

4 days left to complete 5 more works to make it to 100 in 100.

(84)
self portrait with clouds
oil on paper, 17x14 inches

(85)
self portrait, red tube
oil on paper, 17x14 inches

(86)
self portrait, nude in the studio
oil on paper, 17x14 inches

(87)
self portrait with pepper and paintbrush
oil on paper, 17x14 inches

(88)
self portrait, modest
oil on paper, 17x14 inches

(89)
self portrait, ultramarine
oil on paper, 17x14 inches

(90)
self portrait, goddess
oil on paper, 17x14 inches

(91)
self portrait in the studio
pastel, 17x14 inches

(92)
self portrait, blue rectangle
pastel, 17x14 inches

(93)
self portrait, standing
pastel, 17x14 inches

(94)
self portrait, holding shoulder
pastel, 17x14 inches

(95)
self portrait with scarf
pastel, 17x14 inches