The Six Way Book and Drawings a Day

I counted the pages in the six books in one and found there are over 400 paintable surfaces. Filling it up with small watercolors will take some time…lots of time. But it is such a nice meditation time to put some pencil guidelines down and then wet the brush with color.

After the dandelion came these.

The brush strokes of the gesso affect the lines and edges. I need to constantly remind myself to go lightly and layer color from very pale to intense….I just need to be better at doing this and having over 400 pages should give me time and space to improve.

The Drawings a Day continue. The kitchen drawer is getting boring. And also a reminder that I have several things in there that I don’t use. Why do we save this stuff? If I lived in an area to have a garage sale I could get rid of so much! But we are at the top of a hill at the end of a dirt road. As soon as our kids and friend come down, I am going to load them up and they can have their own garage sales. They have been warned.

With no bartender

this fish will aptly open

our favorite beers.

 

Or we reach beyond

the fish and get this rusty

stove tool to do it.

 

This is my second

choice for getting the citrus

juice minus the pits.

 

A while back I was

absolutely sure that I

needed a zester.

I am looking over my blogs and think I would like to talk about the students that I have had and their work that has stayed with me long after they have gone.

Without the art group I miss talking about what drives some of us to make art. Not whether it is marketable, but how in the making of something, the building of a physical form makes tangible the thing, the feeling that just will not stop struggling to get out.

So at least once a week the blog won’t be simply my own record of drawing and paintings in sketch books but the passionate results of things not meant for marketing, not meant to sell a workshop, not consumed by excellence in technical skill, but makes you look and question what you are looking at and why you want to learn more.

And the best part is it will let me revisit those artists that took chances, took advantage of being in a safe place to express their inner feelings.

Some of those blogs will also let me revisit the person I was before…the one I have lost touch with.

Having a minder come in three times a week so I have four uninterrupted hours to be back in the studio has been a good thing. But it is hard to settle into something.

Our son gave me a stack of linoleum blocks for Christmas. I am gouging away to make some sort of textile-ish background for another more solid and contrasting image to print in front of. Australian artist/printmaker, Dianne Fogwell’s excellent book sits next to me. All my carving tools are scattered around. Chips of linoleum are all over the place. My only purpose seems to be to keep busy, make marks, test the tools, let my mind wander down unknown avenues…..

The only thing I know for sure is that I will get another four hours on Monday to see what happens next.

Til later.