This is my 2nd try. It was so nice to get out and sketch this morning after months of not sketching because I moved. My art supplies are some of the last things I’m unpacking.
I went over to Norfolk Botanical Garden thinking I wanted to draw the beautiful bronze figure, but I had a look at the lake first and it was so bright and beautiful in the sun. I said to myself, that statue will be the same all year, let me sketch this before frost wipes out the water lilies.
Now I have to unpack a box of canvases because tomorrow I’m going back to start a painting.
This is my 2nd try sketching daylilies. I think it came out better than the drawing from last week, so next time I’m going to take my pastels and do them in color. They say the heat and humidity will ease up in a couple days. That will make it easier for me to concentrate longer.
These flowers are a bright peachy pink! So bright! So pretty!
They change every day and even in a couple hours are moving to follow the sun, so I won’t be able to use this sketch. Some of the flowers I drew today will be wilted and some new buds will be opening.
I got a mosquito bite. I’m their favorite flavor, O+
The canna is yellow (the tall stalk like plants) and the coleus is dark blackish red (the shorter plants in the fore ground).
I had a look at the lotuses standing in the sun and decided to find some flowers where I could sit in the shade to draw. It’s not as hot as yesterday, but sweat was still dripping off my hair after walking slowly around the garden. After cooling off on a shaded bench for a while I was ok to draw. And there was a little breeze that was nice. I haven’t been out to draw for a while and I enjoyed it very much.
A lady I know liked this sketch and asked me if I was going to do something with it. I told her I’ll just put it on my blog. Sometimes I do a lot of charcoal sketches before I get something that I want to paint.
The thing I enjoy about drawing and painting in plein air is not in knocking out a painting in a few hours, it’s hanging around in a beautiful place for as many days as I feel like being there. In fact, the painting is secondary in my mind. I’m so thankful I’m not on some kind of art treadmill where I’m under pressure to do fast unfinished paintings for some arbitrary time limit rule some person made up. That would destroy the zen like experience of it. And one of my main reasons for not fitting into the art scene. I don’t care if fast unfinished paintings are in style. I don’t care if all the other plein air painters out there take hundreds of photos then trace their best one onto a canvas and go back and hurry fill it in like it was a coloring book. I don’t have to do that.
I’m not interested in taking a class to see if I can paint fast. I’m not interested in taking a drug to make me keep painting all day either, because a drug is the only way I could ever get that kind of energy. So, there you have it friends, apathy to the art world in a nutshell. hahahahahahhaha
This is my favorite piece in the Exquisite Corpse show at Artworks.
The show opened tonight.
I met Paulo Cunha who came down from Canada. Dumaine is in France. That’s one fun thing about the Exquisite Corpse game. Artists from all over the world can collaborate. These two guys have a lot of experience working together on corpses.
The Exquisite corpse is a surrealist art game where two or more artists work on a piece and neither knows what the other has done until it’s finished. The second artist has to try to connect to what the first artist started with only an inch showing of the lines the first artist drew. It’s not easy to explain and it helps to have more than one try because it’s not always easy to do. It only works if both artists use the same medium or colors.
The show is in the skylight gallery at Artworks on 4th St. and Hull St in Richmond VA. If you’re in the Richmond area you should check it out because there’s some crazy stuff in there!
The Pitcher Plants are my favorites in the garden! I’ll never get tired of drawing them.
I’m planning to do a painting with 3 plants and call it “The Trio”. I got inspired by a Rembrandt by that name.
This particular Rembrandt was on loan to the VMFA last year with 2 others. They are small paintings. He did his Trio painting of singers. It was so great to see it! So I got a sketch started of Rembrandt’s Trio in graphite standing in front of it in the museum.. In fact, I had it to myself. I STOLE Rembrandts composition! hahahahahah I don’t see what’s wrong with stealing something great from the masters if you can do it. But then, the 2nd time I went back to steal a little better from Rembrandt, a guard did actually tell me to stop drawing. Drawing wasn’t allowed. I probably can’t show you my sketch of Rembrandt’s Trio. I know photography isn’t allowed in all the exhibits, but drawing? oh well, I got the inspiration. I studied the Rembrandt for hours too.
I’m pretty sure Rembrandt did charcoal studies before he did a painting. This is my 2nd try on a sketch for my Trio painting. The 1st sketch didn’t work.
Sarmistha Talukdar did the left and I finished it on the right.
The Exquisite Corpse is a Surrealist art game where 2 or more artists work together on a piece and neither knows what the other did until it’s finished. so they come out all crazy!
Sarmistha started this one with the Teddy Bear and balloon on the left and covered it up except for 1 ” in the center for me to connect my lines and match colors. Then as the 2nd artist on this corpse, I had to imagine something to connect to the edge of Sarmistha’s side, without taking off the wrapping paper on her side until I was finished. I did the side with Nature. On the 1″ of Sarmistha,s side I could see a touch of green in the cut out shape under the bear’s chin. That’s why I used green too. I found a gell pen at AC Moore that’s close to the color she has. And she used oil pastel too, so I used my oil pastels.
I think it’s an amazing coincidence that we both drew an oval on the top of the picture! I didn’t cheat by lifting the wrapping paper. Maybe we have ESP!
Sarmistha is a scientist for real! she’s Postdoctoral Research Fellow Dept. of Human and Molecular Genetics at VCU
This is an exquisite corpse I started for Henrietta Near to finish.
I tinted an 8 x 10 board with blue acrylic and collaged some pretty and shiny paper on it. I’ll give Henrietta the same paper I used and she can add anything else she wants to on her half. Using the same colors or papers gives the corpse a continuous look to the halves. I covered my half except for 1″ for Henrietta to go by and marked “up”.
Helene Ruiz is having an Exquisite Corpse workshop at Artworks on Hull St. in Richmond VA. on June 18 6:30 to 9. I think it will be fun! If you’re interested in the Exquisite Corpse, join us!
This barn is at the Windemere Gallery in Mechanicsville VA. The man that owns the gallery is Robert Dugan. He’s a nice man and welcomed me to paint there. He told me the barn has a lot of history.
The 1st day I worked on my charcoal drawing on paper. I heard a noisy crow and looked away from my drawing. The crow was chasing a Red Tailed Hawk. Now, it’s not unusual to see birds doing funny things when you go out to the country to paint, so I didn’t think too much about that. I find that a lot of times, I’m alone and see something unusual and have no one there to say, “Did you see that!” or “What just happened!?”
This is the strange thing. One day I was working hard on my painting for a while and stepped back to look at it. I saw a TURTLE COMING STRAIGHT AT ME !!! It was walking slowly, but aiming for my feet. It didn’t look like it wanted to bite me. So I just stood there and watched it. It came over to my feet and looked up at me! I waited for it to say something, but it didn’t, so neither did I. hahahaha I thought it looked like it wanted me to give it food. All I had for a snack that day was some mini doughnuts that got smooshed in my art cart. I decided not to give it a doughnut because I thought that might make the turtle thirsty and it was kind of dry out there. After a minute or so, the turtle walked away, leaving me wondering. Of all the turtles I’ve seen in my life, this was the 1st that wanted to be my friend! (or did it?)
When I was ready to go home, I went into the gallery and Robert was in. I told him I saw some wildlife. He asked me if I saw a groundhog, and I said yes, but the weird thing is, a turtle came over to my feet. He didn’t seem surprised. He told me there’s so many turtles out there, he has to watch out for them when he mows, and stop to move them out of the way so he doesn’t run over them with the mower. And sometimes he feeds them bread. So that explains it.
I love to see the wisteria blooming wild by the side of the road when I’m driving in the country. Sometimes it gets so thick it can choke out trees. This is an old vine at Lewis Ginter Botanical Garden on a stone wall.
First I drew it with charcoal on the paper, then used oil pastel for the wall and as an underdrawing for the Wisteria. The oil pastel alone looked a little weak for the flowers, so I used oil paint and put a second layer on to bring the flowers off the wall visually, by using the contrast of the more solid paint against the more sketchy pastel.
I’m glad I finally got a sketch of the Wisteria, because I’ve been wanting to draw it for years.
Do you like that wisteria? I made that up. hahahahhaha They have a small vine on the other side of the wall. It’s not blooming yet.
The entries for this show, “Poe’s Enchanted Garden” are due this week, so I have to stop working on this painting and let it dry. I still want to make changes because I can see a lot of mistakes in my linear perspective that I could fix. Sometimes I just have to say, I’ll try again next year, and I hope no one will notice my mistakes. Opening night is April 23, 6:30 PM. They’re having “Unhappy Hour”.
Too many people talk about fear of failure. Maybe it was the way their parents raised them to think they can’t make mistakes. I don’t get it. But when I look at this painting, I can’t tell if it’s a success or a failure. A lot of times my paintings get rejected. They’ll probably hang this one, I guess. As an artist, you have to get over fear of failure and just don’t care too much. Apathy helps you in the art world, even though it’s a bad attitude.
This is my 2nd try. It was so nice to get out and sketch this morning after months of not sketching because I moved. My art supplies are some of the last things I’m unpacking.
