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In August, the late Iris Apfel's last book will be released.  It is available to pre-order at this time.  I found it on Amazon, in case you're a fan of this Rara Avis (see link below)! Link to Iris Apfel: Colorful Book in Pre-Order
Recent posts

Practice Pen, Pencil and Marker Work

This recent piece is based on a painting by W.H. Egleton of Philippa of Hainault, consort of King Edward III of England.  It was painted sometime between the 1830s and 1860s.  She lived from the early 1300s to 1369. I took the liberty of modifying Egleton's source image by upturning the lips so she seems more approachable as opposed to the somewhat deadpan expression in his painting.  That said, his work is very nice. What I particularly like in the above -- is the pencil shading done below the top hand so that the arm looks a bit raised from the body and the 3-D sense of that hand shape.  I also like the shading around the throat that gives it a more realistic appearance.  

Remembering Iris Apfel

I happened to be going through a series of images to decide what to draw today and found a colorful photograph of Iris that fit the bill.  Using Muji pen, pencil, watercolor and markers, the drawing below isn't perfect but it does capture the sense of Iris as female fashion maven of bohemian elegance and style.  Interestingly, it wasn't until later today AFTER the image was drawn and dry, I learned of her passing.  What synchronicity! In thinking more about her, it was Iris Apfel's ability to mix distinctly different and, at times, clashing garments with a range of embellishments (sometimes gaudy, sometimes architectural, sometimes cultural, sometimes flea market finds) that resulted in amazing ensembles that only she could wear!   Her personal/career story is amazing too and when you'd expect she would have retired, she was drawn into a second career in fashion in her 80s.  Having lived to 102, Iris embraced an identity that transcended her roots that she would charact

'Re-imagining a Masterpiece' in Art Tribe

The February theme for Louise Fletcher's Art Tribe flip-book of art from members has just been issued!  I'm so excited because this is the big reveal for those of you who are not members of Art Tribe.  The month's theme was Re-imagining a Masterpiece in whatever medium of our choosing.  So here is my re-imagined self-portrait of Vincent Van Gogh and my newest Sharpie painting!  Van Gogh's Self-Portrait Reimagined Vincent Van Gogh - his self-portrait (one of many) Van Gogh painted his self-portrait above in 1889.  What drew me in to want to use it as my source image was primarily the swirly background.  My interpretation is more an inversion of the calm/quiet colors in Van Gogh's work.  Mine is loud and busy yet maintains a dignified and sullen air to his image -- just as Van Gogh did of himself.    This was a such a great challenge idea...thank you Art Tribe! Materials for my Re-imagined Masterpiece:  Bristol Paper, Sharpie Markers, Micron Pen and white Posca pen.

The 31 Days of January - Selected Efforts

The 'Grown-Ups Table' (or GUT as it is fondly called) is Wendy MacNaughton's brainchild on Substack.  As a practicing artist, she led her subscribers through January with daily themed art prompts that included great information about techniques, artists, and art genres among other topics.  It was a super experience and work too.  Part of participation involved reading others' posts and commenting on as many as you could.  With 700-1,000 posts per day, I'm sure some were missed, but I learned a ton from others.  I saw innovative interpretations of the prompts, learned about what people were intending with their work, and what memories they may have chosen to represent visually -- all sprinkled with some laughs along the way.  Thank you Wendy and the GUT community! Photos of some of my favorite work that I did (aside from the blind contour drawing posted in January) are below.  The materials I used throughout the month were colored pens and markers plus watercolor on

February Read and Visual Book Notes

As part of Wendy MacNaughton's 30 Days of Drawing (in January), one day was a lesson on drawn journaling.  In it, she provided examples of authors/illustrators who have used this form in their books.  One of those books that caught my eye was 'Radioactive: Pierre and Marie Curie' by Lauren Redniss.  So, I ordered a copy. After receiving the book and reading through the first couple pages, I realized I needed to create a mind-map/flow-chart to keep track of the information.  This would be my way of summarizing the story in visual form.  With clipboard, cardstock and pens in place, I began reading the book and creating my visual notes -- and finished all in one sitting. As for the book, it is very well-written, interesting and informative, and the artful pages make it additionally engaging.  No wonder it was a finalist for the National Book Award!  As for me, I loved it!  Also, I really like my visual notes because they capture the main points/relationships/events, etc.  I wo

Starting a New Year with GUT with Wendy MacNaughton

Bay Area artist and illustrator, Wendy MacNaughton, mixes drawing, social work and storytelling into rich and fun exercises for children, through her 'Drawing Together' program, and for adults, through the Grown-ups Table (aka GUT) program.  She is a visual columnist for the New York Times and the California Sunday Magazine. To start 2024, Wendy has put together a daily lesson with prompt for each day of January for the GUT group (made up of many hundred to even possibly 1,000+ adult members).  Each lesson has a bit of narrative followed by an exercise to take a suggested 10 minutes.  Her intention -- to help members build an ongoing practice and deliver basic drawing knowledge.   For this month, I broke out an older sketchbook with a lot of blank pages of which many have been filled since January 1st.  I was especially tickled with a recent blind contour drawing (looking only at a source image while moving my pen over the paper in conjunction with my eyes moving around the sou

A Look Forward rather than Back

I've completed those end-of-year things that some people do, like:   creating a 2023 year-end look-back of accomplishments and progress on goals and objectives; writing down [my] 100 best things of last year; and, creating 2024 goals and objectives.  So what next?  This question stopped me in my tracks over the weekend.  I started to think about it and posed this question to myself -- I've mainly looked backwards, haven't I?  My answer -- yes, and in so doing, I've got a plan without a vision.  Deliberating about this over the past few days, I came up with an idea of 'futurizing'...creating a broader purpose to bring into 2024 that progress on the goals will feed.   So, I've created a new zine with that exact title "Futurizing" (by the way, this is a new word I think I've just coined).  Its purpose is documenting me envisioning my future that the achievement of my goals will support.  So, not only do I have a goal of walking 325 miles in 2024,

Happy New Year 2024! -- Working with Goals

It's a new year -- a first day of being able to start with a reset or recommitment to your goals, if you use them.  A new year presents a clean break with whatever you've done in the past/prior year.  Goals are simply thoughts of where we want to see ourselves by the end of the year (or over a longer-term when a project is involved).  Objectives are a more defined vision of what it will take to reach the goals. Making progress on your goals means identifying the reasonable, specific and measurable steps to getting there - these are objectives.     In preparation for my goal-setting and the change in calendar years, I started with a year-end review of my accomplishments and the progress made on my goals in 2023.  It was done in zine form.  The front and back covers (below) bookend 6 pages of the year's highlights, efforts/activities that align with my interest areas, and actual percentages completed -- of my objectives that inform my goals. For goal-setting to be meaningful,

Announcing new book - The Soliloquies of A Wayfaring Trio!

I'm so delighted with my new book -- that I designed, wrote and illustrated, and is now in print thanks to Blurb!   'The Soliloquies of A Wayfaring Trio' was a months-long effort this year.  I had no plan to create a book when I started reading unpacked journals from years ago. Those journals -- started in 1979 -- was at a time when life was about to serve-up some dramatic changes including a solo move from the Midwest to the Pacific Coast.  I wasn't writing poetry then.  In fact, I had never written poetry before, and it was only through those journals that I started writing creatively.   In 1981, that creative writing began with prose (one to four sentences in length).  While taking a 10-month journey to Europe (1982-3), poetry in free verse form started showing up.  An edited version of one of the poems written during that trip appears in the latest book and is titled 'A Day at Nea Kameni' (a location in Greece).   Thereafter, and in looking back, new poems s

New Year's Day 2024 ushers 'Steamboat Willie' in to the Public Domain

Copyright protection for the earliest version of Mickey and Minnie Mouse expires this year.  That means, Mickey and Minnie Mouse characters as used in Steamboat Willie and Plane Crazy (the 1928 version of each) become part of the Public Domain in 2024.  The two early images can then be used for other creative works without fear of copyright law issues.   But WAIT A MINUTE, before taking up brush and paint or pen to make a derivative work, consider that Disney has been in business a very long time and was helpful in extending copyright terms that were approved by Congress.   Copyright law is complicated, and where copyright and trademark apply to the same creative work, that intersection adds unique peculiarities.  Disney still maintains copyright (for 95 years) of each later version of Mickey and Minnie Mouse.  So, it's important to know which version is in the Public Domain.  That said, if the character is trademarked, this sets up other issues when using the Public Domain image w

Luna Luna: Forgotten Fantasy now open!!

The rescued, resurrected and rehabilitated Luna Luna art amusement park is now open in Los Angeles, CA!! The original park appeared in Hamburg, Germany in 1987.  Many of the then unconventional visual artists took part in the park's design including Keith Haring, Salvador Dali, David Hockney and Basquiat among others.  After its closure due to loss of funding, the park's elements were stowed in Conex boxes ending up in Texas with an unknown future.   That future has had a positive development through the efforts of Dream Crew, a multi-disciplinary media company.  As a result, pieces in the original park have been rehabilitated and are being exhibited in a couple of Los Angeles, CA warehouses.  It is now open through the spring of 2024.   It sounds like a fascinating, fun and imaginative project for the visual artists that were involved in the original project as well as those that are re-inventing the idea and its ability to delight new audiences.   For more information and tic

Creative Mornings-Virtual Field Trips

A recent virtual field trip offered through Creative Mornings was on making watercolor and quote zines.  It sounded like a fun idea, since I love making zines every once in a while and have not used watercolor or quotes in them.  The leader provided a few pages of very useful quotes that could be printed out as well as a supply list in advance of the workshop.  At the appointed time, we assembled for an hour.  For me, I needed more time to finish as I had so many scrapbook bits to look through and decide on what to use.  So mine sat unfinished for a little while as ideas took form.  In the finished zines (that I like), some of the leader's quotes and limited watercolor were used.  Both interestingly...wax philosophical.  One is named 'Breathe' and the other 'Fly'.   A shout out to Creative Mornings for its Virtual Field Trips, and for the Watercolor and Quotes Zinemaking session in particular!

Louise Fletcher's 2023 Find Your Joy Course

Wrap-up week has arrived for Louise Fletcher's 2023 Find Your Joy course.  This is my second year of study with Louise and it has been as enriching, in different ways, as last year.   I've done a lot of work in the class.   Strike that!  Actually, I've done a lot of PLAY in the class.  Playing is the perfect way to discover one's buried areas of delight without judgement by unabashedly breaking out favorite, old, new and unused tools, paint, pencils and pens, crayons, watercolor, markers, stencils, pastels -- you name it - and using them to create on a substrate of one's choosing (paper, canvas, wood panel, fabric, etc.).  The most important part is allowing the platy to be what it is, to be open to what it has to teach (especially if one doesn't like it), identifying the parts you like that prompt new explorations, and detaching from result--because it's all about the process.      That said, these are some of my favorite efforts, from the many exercises

My First - A Custom-designed Scarf from Bags of Love/Contrado

A SUCCESSFUL FIRST!  This custom-designed and digitally-printed scarf arrived today.  I uploaded my design and ordered it December 3rd and received it today, December 7th.  I'm very impressed with the company's customer service and the quality of the product, and I'm quite satisfied with the scarf (printed on Silk Sensation from Bags of Love). I'm still interested in having the design printed on a fabric so it is viewable on both sides.  That may mean having it printed on a much lighter fabric (e.g. Poly Chiffon or Silk Georgette).  If you have a fabric suggestion and/or vendor to look into, please leave a comment.   

New York Times Article - Trivia Question: Do you know who sculpted the statue of Lincoln in the Lincoln Memorial?

It was the Piccirilli Brothers!   The six brothers credited with carving the Lincoln statue were named Ferruccio, Attilio, Furio, Getulio, Masaniello and Orazio. In the 19th and 20th centuries, sculptors would normally sculpt their ideas in clay followed by casting them in plaster.  Then the sculptor would hire skilled carvers to translate his vision into a stone sculpture.  Before the Piccirilli's set up shop (a repurposed horse stables) in the Bronx of the late 1800s, an American sculptor would send his plaster cast to Italy for the skilled craftsmen there to execute that vision into stone.  This could take up to a year to complete.   David Chester French, an American sculptor, created the plaster cast of Lincoln for the Memorial.  He learned of the Piccirilli brothers and the extraordinary stone carving work they were doing throughout New York especially in public installations.  Some of those works include the lions outside the New York Public Library, the carved figures in the

Book Review

Recently, I was introduced to Rex Ray's work by Helen Wells, an Englsh artist who does intuitive abstract art using inspiration from nature and objects within and around her home.   Visit Helen Wells' website here Rex Ray was an illustrator and graphic artist who built a successful art business working out of his San Francisco design studio.  You may recall his vibrant images on the record album covers of David Bowie, U2, Rolling Stones, Bjork, Iggy Pop, etc.   After finding himself unfulfilled through his design business, Rex Ray began creating minimalist collages -- playing with line, color and shape in space -- after his days at work.  This practice evolved over a decade and led to an exhibition of those collages called the 'Wall of Sound'.  From there, he moved into the period of the brightest and most beautiful works of his collages that he is renown for and came to him in the later years of his life.   In these later works, there is balance, pleasingly bright pale

The Art of Life is to Show Your Hand

This post's title is part of a larger quote by E.V. Lewis in which he comments on the value of being candid instead of deceptive.  I've taken a portion of his quote -- to literally mean 'show your hand'. Wendy MacNaughton is an artist, illustrator, visual columnist for the NYTimes, and an author.  She is also the Creator and Drawer-in-Chief of DrawTogether, a participatory drawing show for children, and Grown-Ups Table, lessons and a community for drawing-minded adults delivered via Substack subscription.  I've just recently signed up and have been able to access some older articles. In her Nov 5, 2022 piece about how to look at art as an artist, she profiles two inspiring artists one of which is Bisa Butler, an amazing fiber/quilt art designer and maker.   See Bisa Butler's Portfolio here     As part of the article, Wendy included a fun audio exercise of using torn paper to create a hand from your imagination (palm, fingers, fingernails).  I love fun ideas so r

A New Challenge - Looking at What (and Who) You Don't See

A New York Times Op-Art piece from October 16th announced a challenge for anyone to participate in. The purpose is about what you can learn from drawing a stranger.  Wendy MacNaughton is an artist  and graphic journalist.  She also is founder and lead of an art-making club (called 'DrawTogether') for kids as well as one for grown-ups.   In Wendy's challenge, she asks participants to draw the other person's image using 'blind contour'.  This is a technique when you put pen or pencil to paper, look straight at the subject's face, and draw the face without looking down at the paper or your pen.  What do you imagine happens?  Want to try it? Here is a link to the project toolkit that Wendy has put together if you'd like to participate. 'How to' Toolkit from Wendy Below is the article link announcing the challenge in the NYTimes.  Please note you may need a subscription in order to access it. Wendy McNaughton - NYTimes Art Challenge  

Book Review

Stopping by a local bookshop, there---peering out from atop several display shelves was an inviting turquoise blue portal dancing to life as my eyes met the book cover from which it sprang. Thumbing through Lisa Aisato's "All the Colors of Life" is a journey through life's stages in her delightful visual imagery.  She creates art with a sensitive, fun-loving, thoughtful, and dreamy approach and you see that in her work.   This collection of her favorite art works, woven together as phases of life, have heart, tenderness,  curiosity, and are filled with reminders of the moments in life that make memories and are truly the most important.  Link to Bored Panda article on Lisa Aisato and her work

Learning about an Artist I Like...

As part of keeping an art journal in Louise Fletcher's 2023 Find Your Joy (FYJ) course, one part is exploring works we like and writing about why we like them. Over the weekend, a post in a private Facebook group (of Louise's) was about one 'Portrait of the Year' competition.  In it, the posting party mentioned that writing what you see in a piece is more fruitful than just thinking about it, and doing this for your own work can help in seeing it less subjectively. That triggered a thought, because of the writing to do for FYJ. That Facebook post triggered a recollection of an art exhibit I saw years ago that I was awed by.  So, I decided to look for the exhibit publication (saved), and research the artist and his other works.  My plan was to write about what I thought I had liked in the artist's work when I first saw it, decide whether I still like it. and if so, whether for the same or different reasons.  I also wondered if I could articulate the 'why' bet

Explorations - Substrates, Watercolors, and Sharpies, oh my!

These are small studies (3"x3") that were created using remnant paper from other art projects and a variety of art media. The paper included Bristol drawing paper, cardstock, and watercolor paper.  The art media was primarily watercolors (Kuretake and Jane Davenport) and Sharpie pens while the basic sketch was done with a Staedtler Pigment Liner.  Other materials used for decoration included different combinations of Stickles, Posca pens, Gelly Roll pens, Sakura Pen Touch markers and acrylic paint.   One thing I learned is that watercolor on Fluid 100 watercolor paper (300 lb.) is not easy to control when the paper is this small.  Pens and Stickles don't work well on it either.  (Photo of this experiment - not posted.) I also learned that Jane Davenport's watercolors (that come on paper strips) are highly saturated with a wonderful range of hues.  However, they stain and soak very quickly into watercolor paper such that the watercolor can't be moved or removed wit

A Threesome, Sharpie Painting

This piece has been in process for a couple of months and was finished today.   The sweeping/swooping colored shapes are intended to come across as translucent film over the areas they cover including the face, clothes, etc. and sometimes even other swirly shapes either above or below.   It takes time to do this kind of piece, especially since I wanted the subjects to have a recognizable form and some continuity of pose. It requires making color choices that involve gradations and that maintain some semblance of translucency. To do so is tiring because of the thinking through potential color choices and how they're likely to affect the piece. So, for me, work sessions were between two and three hours at a stretch.  More than that dulled my ability to do the kind of envisioning needed.   As I look at this effort, it amazes me that no matter where I start looking, my eye constantly moves around the piece because there is little area for the eye to rest. The entire piece is loud, busy

New Art Book - Highly Recommended

This book, "Poetic Woods", was a serendipitously great find, and I highly recommend it for creatives!!   A book of watercolor/ink/collage paintings and poetry by Ann Blockley, It has been published by B.T. Batsford Ltd. (United Kingdom) and was just released earlier this month.  Ann Blockley has an amazing style and creates images of forests, foliage and poetry in an inspirational way.  She has great observational skills and an extraordinary way of translating the textures and depth of nature, its seasons, and the time of day on to a two-dimensional substrate. The images in the book are tantalizing and the poetry is so fitting with the work and the sites she has visited to nourish her love for the natural world.  

Collage-making

Sometimes you've got to shake things up...do something different. While perusing art work to decide on what I could rework or sacrifice for a class I'm taking, I found a collage start from a couple years ago.  I decided to work on it again.  Finding the 'bones' were there, it just needed a fully-fledged idea.  The added elements have resulted in an intriguing snowflake mandala with the theme of surrendering.  The quote in the piece, by Epictetus, reads, "Don't explain your philosophy.  Embody it."   There was a word that I was toying with adding (Sparkle), but it seemed more like a distraction from the tone set by the other written collage bits.  Overall, this has become so much more than it was and sings in particular because of the pink and purple elements.  I'm satisfied.

Chisel Tip Marker Experimentation

This study involved the use of the chisel nib end of my Ohuhu markers with the goal of making a face. Additional tools used in a more limited way included a Micron pen for the sketch and frenzied hair marks, and gold and silver Pen Touch pens for ornamentation/earrings.  The substrate was watercolor paper. Chisel tip pens are limited by their very size.  They can make a reasonable line though lines made this way will be thicker (e.g. the darker gray-colored random marks in the hair).  An advantage of their size is that you can pull them across the substrate and do repeating lines to create designs (like in the dress and background).  But to do intricate details and coloring on a face -- these pens are really hard to work with and the results show that.   Doing this piece was a total experience of asking what if's:   Can the light green be used successfully for shadow in a lighter area of pink or tan?   What colors work best to give an impression of shadow (for under the hair line,

Introducing 'Kaleidoclown'

For fun, I've drawn one of my own photos (yes, I was dressed in a clown outfit) and added a wild and crazy background to accompany it for today's practice effort. As part of sketching the piece, it was split into four sections with two opposing diagonal lines.  In terms of color choices, I've worked with color gradations for some shape sections.  Can you believe, there are five major shapes in this effort?  There really are -- circles, squares, trapezoids, triangles and spirals. I think the substrate is Biengfang Watercolor Paper (140 lb.).  The materials used were Ohuhu markers, Micron 01 pigment ink pen, some red Stickles glitter glue for the nose, and a white Posca pen (for white dots on the face and to highlight eyes) and a yellow one (for yellow dots in the center of the flowers on the hat). There was no intention in working on this piece other than to have fun...and based on how it looks, I'd say well done!.   One thing I learned is that blending with the Ohuhus i

Using Ohuhu Alcohol Markers with Canson Watercolor Artboard

This is a second effort using my new Ohuhu markers.  The 5-minute sketch (done with a Micron pen) captures the essence of the pose and gender of the subject pretty well. I really liked working with the markers on the Canson Watercolor Artboard.  They flowed nicely and were easier to control than the substrate used in an earlier project.  In the finished piece, I like the illusion of the hairstyle through the line shapes and by using the repeating dark colors.  The random line work on the head covering was fun to do and is an attractive decoration.  I am quite surprised that I like some of the outline 'mistakes' in the piece (e.g. the nose) as they add a bit of character. There are still challenges with blending the marker colors.  The blending marker works differently than I would have thought and seems to work better if used wet under the colors to be combined.  Secondarily, It works to lift color off the page...though isn't an effective erasing agent.  Regardless, I like

Exploring New Substrate and Media

My latest work is an exploration in using new Ohuhu alcohol markers and Fluid 100 Watercolor Paper (300 lb.; cold-pressed). A first step was to rearrange the carrying case the markers came in into six sections (Yellows/Oranges, Reds/Pinks, Greys/Black, Neutrals, Greens/Purples, and Blues/Turquoises).  Then, I created a chart with the color number, name, and samples from each of the marker ends (see first photo).  Then I started a drawing on the new substrate.  The 300 lb. paper is thicker though not hard.  The somewhat cushy texture of the paper is for absorbancy--especially when using watercolors.   The markers work very differently than Sharpies.  They bleed through 140 lb. watercolor paper while with the new substrate bleedthrough was slight.  The Ohuhus are supposed to be blendable.  By the work below, you can see I haven't figured that out yet (even though there was a blending marker included in the set).    I consider this work to have been a test.  It's not my best, but

Latest Sharpie Drawing/Painting - A Suggestion of Symmetry

This piece is the result of a three-day effort beginning with a 5-minute sketch.  I took progress photos along the way -- to remember how I started and all the steps taken in order.   My intention after the initial 5-minute sketch was to have a piece that would be symmetrical or at least strongly suggest it.  This time, instead of wavy lines I've used only straight lines to interrupt the image.  They include horizontal, vertical and diagonal lines that create assorted triangles, rectangles and polygons.  The flesh-tone portion of the face was the first color applied, then the colors for the hair were added next.  With the rest of the piece, I sometimes had to sit and think about what colors to add that would maintain balance across the piece.  In some cases, this meant using small Sharpie-colored bits of paper to audition the colors in order to make a choice. For the floral elements, the petals have been blended to the degree that Sharpies can blend--which is nearly nil. That said,