Les Carnets Baladeurs – sketchbook contribution
I hadn`t done one of these in ages, and when this sketchbook arrived I had a difficult time finding inspiration. The theme is rêveries – dreams – or maybe daydreams is a better translation. The only thing I could come up with was a beach scene – a theme which had already been exploited by previous contributors. As I sat and pondered this, I watched my cats dreaming about their hunting exploits, and, well, yes, that`s what I drew. Here`s the post (in French but it basically says what I just explained).
Le carnet de Bibi est arrivé chez moi il y a un petit moment, mais je manquais d`ìnspiration (et de temps). Ce weekend, en regardant mes 2 chats faire des rêves de chasse, jài trouvé mon idée.
Et maintenant le carnet sèn va vers Sofia….
May sketches, Continued and Discontinued
update : this post is from earlier in the week but I hadn’t been able to publish until now.
I did try to keep up with the Every Day in May Sketching Challenge, but then internet went down for a week and I got really busy, and now I`m off to California until early June, so I’ll post the second group of 5, and maybe find the time to finish the rest while I’m traveling (although I have to admit that “draw some hair”leaves me totally uninspired and I kind of blocked on that one). In any case, it will be fun to get back to some travel sketching, and I’m planning to meet up with my old sketching buddies, Jana, Marta and Desiree. Here then, are the as yet unposted ones, and this blog is officially closed until June 4, at which point I hope to get back to some kind of regular blogging and blog visiting.
107 draw how you get your news – my neighbor, Mr Racine tells me all the gossip
&à! draw a lightbulb
109 draw a clock you have around your house – a view from the back yard
110 draw something with a flame or flames
111 draw a bowl – it’s wonky, but it wasn`t fun so I`m not doing it over
112 draw something fresh
113 draw a fence (my back porch is in the way, but the fence is there)
Draw something ugly you keep for sentimental reasons
the only trophy my daughter ever one for sports – in France they don`t give them out easily. this was basically just for being on the swim all summer one year in New Jersey and showing up for practice. Not really her thing, but she soldiered through.
115 draw a shopping cart or basket – or bag?
116 draw something green
and that’s all she wrote until June.
May is for Sketching
I haven`t been too happy with my artwork lately and so have been keeping it to myself. Wendy Shortland has invited me to join her Every Day in May sketching project, though, so it`s time to wake up a sleeping blog.
Here are the first few sketches, with a shoe instead of exercise equipment, as I don`t really use any equipment but I do walk a lot. These were quickly done – maybe as I keep going I’ll find the inspiration to do something more elaborate, but for now I’m happy just to get it done.
The Loire
A postcard – sized sketch for a friend`s framing project. I`m trying to make a decent oil painting out of this scene as well.
Making Progress in Life Drawing (or at least trying to)
I’ve been doing pretty regular life drawing for a few years now. At first I made progress relatively quickly, having done quite a lot of life drawing when I was in my twenties. But in the last few months I just couldn’t seem to do any decent drawings, and found my mind wandering, my interest waning. It`s easy to find excuses – I don`t like the model, the pose times don`t work for me, it`s too hot in here….Of course I never actually bought into any of those things, but they do sort of float through your head when the drawing isn`t going well.
One thing I`ve tried to push forward is posemaniacs – last year I filled pages and pages with 30-second figures – and this is an excellent way to get your speed up if you are disciplined enough to do it – which I haven`t been this year.
I also tried working through several life drawing books – most recently figure drawing by Michael Hampton. I filled pages with hands and feet (the hard bits for me) but again, I lack the discipline to work through it systematically.
And then, one evening as I felt myself wondering how long to the break, I decided to switch to my left hand. This has been the most useful tool yet. It forces me to concentrate, which focuses my interest – I find myself really enjoying myself and I like my drawings so much more. They have a certain truth to them, even when they`re not particularly accurate. Here are a couple of 2-minute poses – not much time for drawing with the non-dominant hand.
Here are a few of the longer ones from the last three sessions – mostly 5-minutes but sometimes as long as 10 minutes. Once in a while I switch back to my right hand, but I`m not sure anymore which are which. I didn`t always have time to finish, as you can see. While the drawings may not look generally better than what I was doing before, I can see definite improvement in things like hands – and I`m having so much more fun doing it, which is the main thing for me.
Fabienne:
Marc
Céline
That`s what`s been working for me – and you? I`d love to hear about what`s been working for you!
Caped Crusaders
I have 2 black and white cats, a very portly, timid male and a fearless female kitten, who bosses him around with no mercy. When they`re sleeping, they make pretty good models.
Ficelle
A friend of mine asked me to do some small drawings of her cat for a framing project she’s working on (she needs 3). Here are a few preliminary ones. I’m working from photos, and I find it difficult not to get fussy, so I’ll probably do a few more of these until I get it right.
100 Landscapes – number 36
cross-posted here
I’m calling this a landscape because there is a horizon in it, although it’s really just a sky study….The camera filtered out all the yellow tones for some reason, and made the clouds look green. I really need to learn to take better photos of my paintings.
Drawing from Life – with my Left Hand
I’ve been distracted while doing life drawing lately, which has had a negative effect on both the quality of my drawing and my enjoyment of the time spent doing it. On Tuesday evening I could feel it happening again, so I decided to draw with my left (non-dominant) hand, to see if I could at least learn something. Surprisingly, the experience became much more pleasant – I could feel myself instantly concentrating on what I was doing, and taking much more pleasure in it. We never do warm-ups in either of my drawing groups any more. In one, we only do 5 to 7 minute poses, and the in other one we only do a couple of 3 minute poses, and not even in the beginning. I’m happy to say that drawing with my left hand really seems to take the place of fast drawings for me.
Here they are – a little rough, but I find them a bit less boring than the more polished that ones I had been doing, they feel more authentic somehow. None of them are ‘finished’ as I draw very slowly with my left hand. These are mostly 5-minute poses with one lasting 7 minutes.
New Landscapes
I have had a hard time getting back into painting (not to mention blogging and even visiting blogs) this fall. Anyway, I have finally broken through to the other side of whatever was keeping me from painting, and am thus able to present numbers 34 and 35 on this journey to 100 landscapes. I hope the rest of the winter will be more productive.
We had a gorgeous autumn here in Touraine this year. A few weeks ago, while I was out walking with my sons Damien and Paul, a storm rolled in in the distance, creating a thrilling contrast between the dark stormclouds and the gold afternoon light we’d had until then. Luckily we were armed with a camera. I think Damien took the photos. Here is my feeble attempt to paint the scene.
I was thrilled to have finally finished a painting, but felt there was too much detail in it, so I did another one.
And now all I feel like doing is painting.
