Sketching Flowers in my Nature Journal

This time of year, the world overflows with blossoms!

We live outside as much as we can, so why not take a nature journal along?

This year, I researched flowers that deer don't eat, and discovered gorgeous flowers like foxglove and gladiolus to fill my garden with.

What's growing and blooming near you?

Why not take your nature journal to a park or garden center and make some sketches?

A few sketches a day will build your drawing skills faster than spending hours every few weeks.  Your steady practice will gradually improve the connection between what you see and what you draw.

And, it's fun to allow yourself time to play with your art supplies and connect with nature.

Happy Creating!

Copyright Betsy Bangley 2024.  All rights reserved. 

Spring Nature Journal: Song Sparrows, Slugs & Foxgloves

A quiet, rainy day may not seem like a day you could make lots of observations in your nature journal, but you never know what show the earth has in store for you!

 A Song Sparrow just outside your window ...

Flowers blooming off your front porch ...

Even a slug streaming across your front stoop!

Nature puts on a show all day, every day, and your ticket to the show is simply taking the time to sit and watch.  Having a nature journal deepens your connection, and lets you take in more details than simply snapping a photo with your phone and moving on.

I hope you take the time this week to "buy a ticket" to nature's show this week and make some observations in your journal!

Happy Creating!

Copyright Betsy Bangley 2024. All rights reserved.

Bumblebees & False Blue Indigo Flowers

I've been teaching a Nature Journaling course for the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at Carnegie Mellon Institute.  We've been finding beautiful ecosystems right on the CMU campus, including this one planted with endangered Wild False Blue Indigo and Golden Alexander.  

This little oasis of nature in the city attracted droves of honeybees and a steady stream of bumblebees to the flowers.

How lovely to see nature at work in the city!

I hope you get a chance to see nature at work, wherever you live, and to make some sketches in a nature journal this week!

Happy Creating!

Copyright Betsy Bangley 2024.  All rights reserved. 

Nature Journaling Surprises

I have a window right next to my studio worktable, where I sit and drink tea in the mornings.  

Sometimes, a wild visitor shows up unexpectedly, and I reach for my nature journal to take in the creature's beauty.  

Nature journals allow us to deepen our experience in those magical moments when an animal gets close to us.  A quick sketch -- finished later -- records the experience, and we can return years later to remember that brief moment of connection with nature.

I started with blind contour drawings -- just watching the bird and letting my pen follow on the paper.  I didn't look at the journal page while I drew, so things didn't line up quite right.  Later, looking at images online of mockingbirds helped me to finish these sketches with colored pencils.

Wishing you many happy connections with nature!

Copyright Betsy Bangley 2024.  All rights reserved.

Nature Journaling: Toad Trilling Day!

Out on a paddle with David this spring, we made our way up the creek that feeds Raccoon Lake, surrounded by the sounds of hundreds of American Toads trilling.

American Toads are generally solitary and dwell on land, but during the mating season, they gather in wetlands, where the males sing to attract females.

Roughly 50 toads sat within eyesight along the water's edge and swam in the shallows, tumbling over each other, singing their hearts out.  They weren't as afraid of us as they would be other times of the year.  

We stopped at a little sand bar, where David took photos while I sketched. 

 

When we sat still on the shore, the toads carried on as if we didn't exist.  Fearlessly, a male toad surfaced and crawled out of the water two feet from where I sat sketching.  What a magical feeling when he started his song!  One toad even walked across my foot. I was honored.

Spring is a fantastic time to take your sketchbook out into nature.  Even a city park is likely to have birds singing, flowers blooming & trees full of newly unfurled leaves.

What draws your eye in nature right now?  Take a few minutes to jot down a list, make a few sketches, and just breathe in the fresh air.

Happy Creating!

Copyright Betsy Bangley 2024.  All rights reserved. 

What If? Little Free Library Update

What if you loved making painted bookmarks and secretly giving them away?  

You could find interesting novels in Little Free Libraries and tuck your bookmarks in the pages for the next reader to enjoy.

You could even get the help of someone who knew where all the little Free Libraries were in a neighborhood. 

Perhaps enjoy an evening stroll & chat together, slipping decorated bookmarks into books all around the neighborhood.

You could enjoy the artistry of the little Free Libraries themselves

Wouldn't that be fun?

I hope you take time this week to play with your art supplies, and share what you make with someone else.

Happy Creating!

Copyright Betsy Bangley 2024.  All rights reserved.

Tiny Art from a Photo

A day spent out with my eldest kid in Frick Park, Pittsburgh yielded this photo, the perfect inspiration for the quick watercolor sketch below.

I didn't make a pencil drawing, just loaded up my brush with Permanent Rose and Rose Madder Hue, and set out to sketch with a brush on a 6" x 7.5" piece of watercolor paper.

Playing with watercolor sketching in a nature journal or just on a sheet of watercolor paper is a fun way to warm up for more creative projects.  Let loose, general shapes be your goal.  After the first pass, you can add more details.

Happy Creating!

Copyright Betsy Bangley 2024. All rights reserved.

The Artist's Eye & the Camera

On a hike back in April, I made a rough sketch in my nature journal of the central tree in this photo.

I didn't have time to finish the drawing, so I took the photo, thinking I'd finish later with a gouache painting over top.

Scrolling through my photos later, I nearly deleted this picture, as it's just not a good nature photo.  But, it is a good reference for my purposes.

I used it when painting this scene right over top of the original pen sketch I made in my nature journal.

I'm sure you can see plenty of variations between my painting and the reference photo.

I often tell my students, "You're not a camera, you're an artist!" 

You don't have to perfectly render any part of the real world.  

There's no requirement to make photorealistic art.

Realistic drawings and paintings are valid, fantastic pursuits, but you, the artist, don't see things the way a camera does.  You have feelings, and interests that focus your attention on certain portions of any scene.  You likely will become fascinated by one bit in a larger scene, for me it was this tree. That fascinating part of the larger scene is where the magic is. 

Let your eyes dwell in the places that attract them. Stay true to your personal vision. Never feel you must draw or paint every part of a scene.  Simplify.

What makes artwork sparkle is your enchantment with what you're drawing or painting.  You'll notice that the part of a drawing that comes alive is often the part that you delighted in looking at and drawing.  

Let the painting or drawing grow out of that one bit that caught your eye. For me in this case, it was the dark, crooked tree limbs held against the sky, with fresh spring growth just unfurling.  It was the spring bringing color to a landscape that had been winter drab for too long. 

Next time you're out for a walk, notice what catches your artist's eye.  What in the world holds magic for you?  What enchants you? Let your eyes dwell there.  

If you have time, make a sketch, take a photo, embark on an artwork, and show the world your artist's vision of what's fascinating to you.

Copyright Betsy Bangley 2024. All rights reserved.

More Tiny Art:A Portrait of My Cat

A little scrap of watercolor paper suggested itself to be used one morning in this watercolor sketch of my cat.

I find that starting with an animal's eyes establishes the scale.  Eyes express the life & personality in a creature.

It's fun to play with colors rather than match reality.  As long as you get the correct light-to-dark values, you can use any colors that appeal to you, and the painting will look real.  

I hope you'll try your hand at sketching animal portraits.  You can use this photo above, or one of your pet as a reference.  If you're looking for more good photos, you can use these to practice drawing or painting animal portraits:

https://betsyblissart.blogspot.com/p/pet-portraits-in-colored-pencil.html

Happy Creating!

Tiny Art: Morel Mushroom

Out hiking the other day, we found this morel mushroom under a bower of Christmas ferns.  I snapped this photo and then painted the scene in gouache in my studio.

I'll bet you could scroll through your phone right now and find a photo of a flower, or other inspiring bit of nature you'd like to make a drawing or painting of.  

Making it small and simplifying the scene will help to prevent feeling overwhelmed.

Remind yourself that you're just going to play around with art supplies.

When you're done, set it aside and come back to it a day later.   It took me about 12 hours to decide I liked my little gouache painting in my nature journal.

Happy Creating!

Art Journaling with Word Art

Part of what makes art journaling so freeing is the fact that there is no wrong way to do it.  You simply follow the little sparks of ideas you get when you pick up art supplies -- from paints to butterfly wings, to old books.

Above is an Altoids tin I glued vintage book page bits, tea bag paper and other ephemera to. It stores snippets of text for art journaling.

Words snipped out of old books, magazines or wherever you like can be added to your art journal pages.

Clipping them out can be a relaxing way to slip into your creative mode, and you can assemble them into poems that don't have to mean anything to anyone but you.

I was thinking of a dream cruise to Alaska, and found these bits in an old travel book.

You can often find old books in thrift shops, rummage sales, and in free piles at libraries, etc.

The books I use were mostly saved from going into a dumpster.

Why not give some old text a new life in your art?

Happy Creating!

Tiny Art Journal

I just finished teaching my Tiny Art class at the Community College of Beaver County.  We had a wonderful time painting small natural items with gouache.

For our final project, we made journals using old books and book covers, and mounted our paintings inside.

I removed the text from an old, tattered textbook, and refilled it with 140# watercolor paper cut to size.

I simply tied the folded pages in with a thick piece of cotton string. No sewing or binding required!

My class demonstration paintings are mounted on the pages within.

Several pages remain blank at the back -- space to add new paintings to my book.

I love the handwriting in old books, and the worn, yellowed look. It adds character.

I invite you to take a class with me.  For a list of my upcoming classes in Beaver & Washington Counties, PA, follow this link:

https://ccbc.coursestorm.com/

Click on "Arts" 

You can also check out my "Take a Class with Betsy" page here: https://betsyblissart.blogspot.com/p/online-art-classes.html

Happy Creating!