What, No Picture? Two Stories

I have two stories to tell from my travels these last 24 hours. No pictures because while I do have a sketch to show for one, I dropped my camera and can't upload pictures right now.

First, I had the privilege of attending a Braves / Marlins baseball game in Atlanta last night. It's the first time I've been to a big stadium (I've been to Durham Bulls games, but that's a small stadium). I did a sketch during the fourth inning. I was struck by an amazing contrast. On the one hand you have the state-of-the-art video wrapping the entire structure, synchronized over dozens of huge monitors up several stories, enabling the display of an enormous fluttering virtual American flag during the national anthem, and showing stats and scores throughout the game. You also have the stadium itself, with tier upon tier of cantilevered banks of seats, sophisticated lighting that made it as bright as day, and a sound system that could probably be heard a mile away. On the other hand you have the gem in the center of this amazing twentyfirst century setting - a dirt diamond in a field of grass where men run in circles and hit a leather ball with a stick. Don't get me wrong - I love the subtlety and craft that is the American game of Baseball - but the game could have been played in regulation style in the stone age, because there is nothing modern about the materials of the game itself. So the contrast with the stadium was epic, to me.

Somewhere in the bottom of the eighth, with the game pretty much a foregone conclusion (Braves winning by a handsome lead after two home runs with two RBIs each), I looked up to notice that the huge column of light rising from the immense bowl of stadium had attracted a circling swarm of high flying night birds, with shapes unfamiliar to me, eating the swarms of insects drawn to all those stray photons. This is in downtown Atlanta, with miles of concrete, stone, asphalt and brick on all sides - where did the insects and birds come from?

Second, on my way through security in the Atlanta aiport today I was behind a woman in her forties with intriguing boots. They took a deal of unlacing and I made a joke about it (I'm the sort to lighten moments in line with strangers...). This led to a conversation because they were boots for motorcycling. She was recently returned from motorcycling through the Alps, and was on her way to Salt Lake City to rent a Honda motorcyle and drive to Seattle in ten days, via Jackson Hole, Yellowstone, etc. I looked at her carefully, because it takes some muscle to handle a motorcycle, and she probably weighed under 100 pounds. She went on to say that she also danced ballroom, and had her ballroom costume/shoes and her watercolor materials packed, and not much else, because she planned to do ALL of it on this trip. I asked where the ballroom would be done, "Surely not Jackson Hole," and she grinned and told me that was precisely where she would be dancing. We fell to discussing her art materials (very simple - pens, watercolor pad, and just one color of liquid watercolor, a blue).

At this point we were putting our bags on the conveyor and concentrated on the task before us. She went through the scanner before me wearing a thin cotton shirt and a light vest of some space-age material (she had said her clothing was minimal and all chosen for the ability to wash, wring, and dry in minutes). The TSA agent on the other side felt the need to pat her down, and poked her in the sternum as part of checking the vest. This apparently hurt, and the woman poked the TSA agent back, in exactly the same manner, telling her that it hurt and that she was getting her fingers caught on the front of her bra. The TSA agent remained professional, but I winced, because a law enforcement officer is a law enforcement officer, and they can't be handled that way. She made the woman come back through the scanner and place her vest on the conveyor. For a moment it looked like the woman was going to resist, but then she came back through and did as she was told. When she passed back through I could hear the TSA agent taking her and her bags aside and quietly lecturing her on what she had done (laid hands on an officer without permission or warning) and that this was not acceptable. When I had reassembled my own clothes, shoes, and bags I looked back and saw the woman seated in the TSA security area, still getting a lecture...

I had noticed well prior to our turn that TSA was in a physical mode today. I have passed through these check points dozens of times in the last year, and have only seen one or two pat-downs. Today, on the other hand, they were touching nearly everybody. They squeezed the fat braids of two traditionally dressed Indian ladies ahead of us, wanded and patted down a young African American man next, then the woman I had been talking to, and then I even got patted on the chest and shoulders (first time I can recall that), possibly they thought I was with the woman who was making trouble. It was interesting, a bit disturbing, and I understood both sides (as I often do) which did nothing to make me more comfortable.

I just looked up ballroom in Jackson Hole and there is a place called the Snow King Center Ballroom... Do they dance there? Was she for real?

The Result of Lines I Drew in August

This is the final result of a longer than usual meditation on lines, light, and my own face. I feel most at liberty to play with my own face, which is why I like to draw and paint it. Besides, I have more info on what goes on behind that face than any other, and that seems to inform the resulting images. As usual, my camera has understated the green a bit and reduced the contrast, but this is close.

The remaining four photos (I apologize for the weak light on these) were taken over a month of at several stages of the drawing and painting. These paintings seem to develop gradually, organically. The big leap was from the lines to see the face, realizing I needed to photograph myself from a certain angle, and laying in my portrait. The rest was a series of smaller discoveries.

Click for larger images. The final painting is 19 x 19, watercolor on Arches 140 lb hot press paper (my favorite - "bright white").

Painted mostly with Louise (a # 12 English Cotman 111 round) and a newcomer, Tildie (a #10 English Cotman round, used for the birds). Frondine laid in the yellow and blue in the Phase 4 image below - she's the big girl in my brush jar, a #22 "Ebony Splendor" flat. The rest of the jar is mostly a bright blue Cotman ghetto (and not all girls, my oldest pal in the jar is Abner).

Life Drawing - Sept 6 2011

Again, I was able to get into a new drawing space with these. Lighter wash this time - allowing me to build the tones more gradually, which I enjoyed on the longer poses. On the last two of these I got a bit heavy with the marker, and I think it detracts from the figure. All of these begin with wash first, applied quite quickly (30 seconds or less), then the china marker, then back and forth between wash and marker to get the enphasis, shadows, and light. They could all be better in hundreds of ways, but they're getting where I want to go, and that's still exciting.

Another dancer for a model - it makes a difference. These progress from 2 minutes, to 3 minutes, and then to 10, 15 and 20. The pad I was using is a 14 x 17 Strathmore sketch, and you're seeing just about whole sheets in each of these images. Inexpensive, but able to take the punishment of the wet and dry combination. The image with the rocking chair also has some nupastel rubbed in (umber and an intense blue).

Click for larger views. My favorites in this set are the third (sitting up and turned away from the viewer) and the fifth (close up vignette, shoulder to knees).

Wisteria - Duke Gardens

We had a relatively dry, cool day right after Hurricane Irene had passed NC, and we went that morning to Duke Gardens. Dearest and Oldest took photos, youngest stayed with me and read a book, and I drew. Initially I settled down to sketch the light on bushes and plants in the terraced garden, but it bored me after 10 minutes and I walked away. In the wisteria gazebo there are open-work steel columns made so the vines can grow through and up. The vines and leaves completely cover the roof of the large gazebo, one of the most recognizable landmarks on Duke's campus, and the ancient vines make quite a show in the columns, as well. So I found a dual page in my home-made bound journal of watercolor scraps (cut from dozens of paintings) and I did this study. Two colors of ink, graphite, and a little green Prismacolor. About 18 by 7 inches. Click image for a larger view.

Bull Durham Suntrust Sketch

The fun thing about drawing in public is the conversations. While I sat in the hot son and laid out this sketch, I had to repeatedly sight (with my pencil held up or sideways) the locations of different window lines or the proportions and arrangement of objects. It was a challenging subject to get correct - I wanted to be sure to position the stories correctly, and have the right number, etc. The perspective, as the building rose before me, demanded a gradual shrinking of the height of each layer. As it is, I still didn't get the sides correct - compare to photo below.


A group of elderly ladies and gentlemen were congregated in the shade across the street, talking and having coffee. One crossed the street, came up behind me, and asked, "What exactly is it you're doing when you hold up your pencil like that?" It was an intelligent question, and not one I've been asked before. I described how artists neep to map what's before them onto the two dimensional surface, and they use their thumb or drawing tool to compare proportions, or find half and quarter points, to position things correctly. I showed her some tiny hash marks on my paper, which were dividing the space into quarters, and pointed out that the pencil helped me find which line on the building was half way up, and then a quarter of the way up, and then how many lines of windows and dividers were in between, etc. - so I would get them right. She said that made sense, and she thanked me for the answer.


I only did the pencil work on this one while in the sun. I walked to a table in the shade to ink it in, and then did the watercolor from memory several days later, in a hotel room. I had taken several photos (pasted together here - and taken from not the same spot where I did the sketch, hence the changes in angles) to use as reference for the painting, but I didn't need it. I found I could vividly recall the colors I wanted.


This sketch will also appear on our Durham blog, of course. Top of the Triangle. The bilding is the Suntrust Bank building, one of the older landmarks and taller buildings in downtown Durham. The bull is a big, nearly life size bronze set in a small park across the street.

Life Drawing Aug 25 2011

I've mentioned that I have been wrestling with the washes and lines at life drawing sessions for the last several months. It's felt like starting over, and I've left several recent sessions without a single drawing I cared to show anyone. And it hasn't bothered me - I've been quite content in the pursuit, the chase. The fact that it's been disorienting and largely a mess has pleased me, because it meant I stepped a decent distance out of my comfort zone. I'm learning something new, for me, anyway. That was the point.

Last Monday I fell at the airport (water on the floor outside the men's room). I caught myself on a wall (bruise on my shoulder to show for it) and thought little more of it, in a rush to make my flight. Later, however, my lower back began to hurt, and it's taken the whole week to gradually get better. Last night it was still bad enough that I didn't think I could get through the whole drawing session, and I did end up leaving before the two long poses in the second hour, but I really wanted to go.

So when the first 2 minute drawings came out pretty well, and the poses (one of our best models) were unusually inspiring, I was a bit giddy. The first three drawings were all on one page (first image, above). The next two were not so good (not shown here), but then the first five minute pose was my favorite drawing of the evening (second image, above, leaning on the chair). We roared right on to the rest of the five minute poses (shown above and below, two together and one more on the page alone) - so I didn't get any opportunity to dance around the room, but I wanted to. This drawing is approaching what I'm after with this switch to wash and suggestion.

I sharpen a bit of watercolor crayon into an empty yogurt container and add water. I grab a jar from over the ArtCenter sink and fill it with water for rinsing. The drawings begin with quick, spontaneous work with a flat one inch brush in the wash - 30 seconds or less. Then I picked up a china marker, of all things, and tried to move as fast with the lines. The second image above, my favorite this evening, approaches the mix of line and shape and the balance of stated and unstated that I'm seeking. There are still things I wish were different - but this is more than half what I wanted, and that's a breakthrough. A different part of me is moving the brush, and that affects the later work with the markers.

This last image is the 15 minute pose we did before the break, and before I packed up to leave because my back needed a break. The drawing was actually complete in 10 minutes, after which I stood there looking from the paper to the model and back. I finally added the second layer of wash on the underside of her upraised arm, and the light wash to the right of her navel, careful to catch the shapes of the shadows. Then I added the small splash on the far right because the composition needed a little balancing. Three touches of the brush during that last 5 minutes. I didn't see anything else I could add that would improve the drawing. There were a few things I would have liked to change, but that's not in the rules.

Some part of me has floated all day today on the drawings from yesterday. I kept losing parts of conversations today because I kept drifting back into the spot where these were created. This has approached an obsession; it is becoming even more intoxicating now that I'm getting tastes of where it might go next.

I've done some other sketches (so some relief for those of you who would like to see something beside nudes) and I'm working on the self portrait. But the figure work is the main journey at the moment, and it affects all the rest.

Playing with the Food - Trois

Bonsoir. Etienne has again granted the keyboard to moi, but under condition of telling the story of the market veggie. Deux Poulets brought aubergines to Etienne, from a friend. But voila, they are one "eggplant," as you call them here. Une stem, deux "eggs." This was the invitation to play with his food. Etienne said this has happened before - this is the third time.

So these photographs show the route from vegetable to animal. The lovely purple of the aubergine with a little yellow, like the sun. Etienne says the Sharpie and pencils were right for the turtle, and the finer pen and aquarelles for the petit mason which turtles carry on their backs. Quelle pittoresque.

Ettiene said he has never so closely looked at the segments on the little house. The way they connect and the vertebrae amused him. Back? Shell? Ribs? Mason? Oui.

And are we not all edible in the end? New eggplant friends, potato fish, grenouilles? I have heard that to some even humans are a meal. There are even reptiles which are at the top of that food chain, but, il es regrettable, no amphibiens, though Etienne has told me that the bullfrog Africaine eats mammals. The chain is more a mobius, oui?