Pencil Shavings

365 Days of Art - Day 143 - Ribbet!

Dot, dot, dot, dot!  Day 143 I was playing in my sketchbook and smooshed some watercolour paint between two pages.

After it dried I had a look and figured that there was something kinda froggy about it.

Then I took my PITT brush pen and dotted away until the little critter hopped out.

This stippling technique takes quite a while and is an exercise in patience.  But I do like the effect.  It's the same technique (minus the watercolour) that I used on this sheep drawing.

I like him.  He's kind of unassuming, but cute.

365 Days of Art - Day 142 - Kya at Rest

I have been trying to distill the cat image for myself. 

On day 142 I did a lot of sketching and fiddling around with different things. I tried brush pens and straight watercolour sketching.

In the end this is the one that I am happiest with.  It's not to fuzzy but totally conveys the idea of "cat at rest".

I used a PITT brush pen in black and Daniel Smith Watercolor Sticks in Quinacridone Burnt Orange and Undersea Green.

I have always envied artists who can convey what they want to say with a minimum of fuss.  I feel a little closer to that now, it may never be my style, but it is a challenge for me and I'm glad I'm looking closer at my subjects to try and capture their essence.

365 Days of Art - Day 141 - Nap Attack!

Why am I so taken with cats lately?  Must be winter setting in and my desire to hibernate!

I did this one in a small sketchbook with charcoal.

I like the softness that the charcoal gives her fur.

My busiest time of the year personally is upon me.  Brithdays, Christmas, entertaining, and dealing with the winter weather. 

Our first winter storm arrived over the weekend and we are buried in it.  As well as it being about -27C I would love to nap my days away!

Maybe my kitty will share her pillow?

365 Days of Art - Day 140 - Cat Attack!

Still with the cats... what is it with me?

Day 140 and my hands were filthy with graphite powder that I had rubbed into the page of my sketchbook and then lifted with an eraser.

I could have done more with this, and now that I'm looking at it with fresh eyes I want to go back and start touching up (typical artist, always wanting to fix and fix and fix)

I do like the face (eyes, nose and mouth) and I'm thinking that a bit more work on the body could really make him into something.

That would be a project for a different day though.  Today's project is all about a little girls birthday!

365 Days of Art - Day 139 - Cat Nap

I am a cat lover, but I haven't spent an undue amount of time trying to capture the essence of our delightful family pet.

I'm not sure why.  I know some folks who draw their pet every day, I'm just not one of them.

But lately I've been drawing a lot of cats, my cat especially, and trying to get her down to the essence that is her.  

The top photo is the right colour, but not the right attitude.  She's very laid back and this cat has a little too much ear wiggle going on.

The bottom ink and wash piece is much closer to her, lying in the sun watching her "pet" birds at the feeder.

I've been trying to work on the simple drawing of the cat.  They have so much grace and slinky style that I would love to get that all down in one line of ink one day.

This could quite possibly be the quest of a lifetime.

365 Days of Art - Day 138 - Little Man

About a month ago I took my nephew out for a day at the zoo while his mom and dad and big sister were busy moving their stuff out of their home, preparing to start a new adventure in their lives.

It's bittersweet for me.  I love them, and I love having them close to me, but I know why they need to go and at start this new part of their lives, so I'm helping them as much as I am able to.

My hour of art for Day 138 is a portrait I drew of the little man.  I sure love him and his adorable dimples.

I'm going to give this to my brother and sister-in-law for Christmas (I wish I had a great picture of my niece too, but I'll get one after I give this one and do another for them.)

Life changes so much.  As soon as think that we know how it's all going to play out something happens and throws all of our plans to the wind.

Hopefully I can find a beautiful kite to fly in the winds of change.

365 Days of Art - Day 137 - It's a Zoo!

It was a cold day on Day 137, and it was a day off school.  So I took the kids to the newly opened conservatory at the zoo.

The butterflies haven't taken up residence yet, but the conservatory was lovely and warm and full of beautiful plants.  We sat to paint, then would move to another vantage point and paint again.  We took lots of pictures and slowly made our way through both sides of the lovely building.

The girls painted lots of things (even things that weren't there, like butterflies) and I filled up several pages with little studies, some of which I posted here.

It was a lovely morning spent with the girls and it reminds me that I should really spend more painting days at the zoo where so many subjects are there waiting to be observed.

What I really need is a small collapsible stool to take and sit on where there aren't any benches, but good vantage points.  I think I'll make more of an effort to get my painting out of doors, even in the winter!

As The Crow Flies (or something like that)

I have finished my painting "So Comes Sorrow" and I am really happy with how it came out.  Sometimes I get an image in my head, and I don't know how I will translate it into paint, but I know that I have to try no matter how difficult.

Working in watercolour provides that extra risk too, because there are no do-overs in watercolour.  Then I had to add the extra challenge of working in only three colours (shakes head).  But in the end, as you can see in yesterday's post, it came out looking great.

Part of the success I'm sure is from the success of my charcoal study of the crow.  This came out beautifully, the darks a deep, the background is velvety, the eye is bright and alert.  The study gave me lots of confidence to move forward onto the finished piece.

The study also spoke for itself.  Usually I don't do much with studies, but this one is really nice.  So nice that I decided to offer it up as a print on Imagkind.  So here it is, just in case it speaks to you too.

365 Days of Art - Day 136 - Three Colours One Brush - So Comes Sorrow

So Comes Sorrow

This is a 12x9 inch watercolour that I created with just three colours (Daniel Smith Watercolor Sticks in New Gamboge, Permanent Alizarin Crimson, and Phathlo Blue (GS) ) and one brush, a No 6 Rhapsody sable round.

This is a very dark painting (the photo really doesn't do it justice, the dark blue on the feathers is nearly black.) I created the black for the crow with the three primaries.  It all hangs together because I used just the three colours instead of using a huge range from my palette.  Less is really more in this case.

I've been telling you about limited palettes, how you can use just a few colours to really make a bold statement.  Well here is some proof.  This is one of my best pieces of the year and I created it with three colours and one brush on Day 136 of the 365 Day Challenge

365 Days of Art - Day 135 - Subtracting

 On Day 135, using some of the techniques that I have been using with pastel, I threw myself into the graphite powder with more daring.  I rubbed the powder into the paper to get the tone as dark as I could.  Then I took my kneadable eraser and lifted out bits of highlights to start forming a face.  There are a few interesting marks and directions started that were never completed, but over all you can see the features emerging out of the gray cloud of graphite.

I really like this technique.  I can see lots of interesting ways that I can use this and I'm looking forward to trying them out.  I enjoyed adding in some detail with an 8B pencil, but mostly letting the face evolve by subtracting, taking away the graphite until I found what I was looking for.

I think this is going to be fun.