Mixed Media Concertina Sketchbook

My cat, Grover, kindly posed for sketches in my latest accordion-fold sketchbook.

I love to read in the evenings, and have been delving into Jane Stobart's Extraordinary Sketchbooks, where I got the idea to make a collaged sketchbook like architect Karen Butti.

I used a base of 140 pound watercolor paper, and glued on painted papers & old maps with Yes! Paste. 

Below is the cover of the sketchbook, decorated with music sheeting that's been painted with several thin layers of acrylic paint.

 

 The surface of these papers is slick, which would make it difficult to draw on top of them with graphite, charcoal or colored pencils.  I applied clear gesso over both sides of the sketchbook to add a layer of grit without obscuring the designs underneath it.   

My cats were hanging out in the studio when I started sketching, so they fill the first pages.

I love that I can sketch with rich, black charcoal and white pastel pencils.  The painted paper underneath adds another layer of pattern and color.  It feels exciting to have a new sketchbook with a variety of colorful papers

The songbirds hunting seeds in the flower box outside my studio window fit perfectly on the map of Glacier Bay, Alaska.  

Dark-Eyed Juncos scratch on the earth for seeds, so I put black oiler sunflower seeds in my flower beds for them. It's a protected spot, and it brings them closer for me to draw.

Collaging colorful papers onto a plain sketchbook adds a playfulness and imperfection that invites doodling.  If you're feeling anxiety facing the blank page, maybe a collaged page would help you push past that feeling and make drawings.

The beauty of drawing in a sketchbook is that your artwork doesn't have to be "pretty" or "perfect."  Truly in this world, there is no such thing as perfect, so try looking at drawing as an exploration, a voyage of discovery. Every drawing teaches you something.

Happy Creating!

Osher Figure Drawing with Model Jamie

We had a new model last Friday in Osher Figure Drawing class named Jamie.  She's quite skilled and creative, and she helped us to sharpen our ability to draw foreshortening.

We started with two-minute continuous line drawings of Jamie's expressive gestures.  Her poses were alive and sensitive, and we could see her background as a dancer shining through in her movements.

We moved on to two-minute foreshortening gestures.  Our goals were to

1) Find a foreshortened limb to focus on.

2) Draw the bone structure underneath the foreshortened limb and supporting area, 

noticing the shortened appearance of the foreshortened bit.

3) Draw the outer body around the bones.

We built Jamie's foreshortened body from her skeleton up.

We were warmed up and ready to deal with more complexity.  Jamie took an hour-long pose, with breaks of course, and we delved into expressing her pose, foreshortening and all.

Many thanks to model Jamie. I could see the way her creativity inspired my students to draw lively, fresh compositions.

Figure Drawing with Amelia

Model Amelia kicked off our first class of the semester at Osher with athletic, artistic poses.  

We jumped right in with rapid 5-line drawings to warm our hands and eyes up.

 

Turning our charcoals on their sides, we created mass gestures from Amelia's expressive poses.

As we warmed up, we added a few contour lines.

We finished the class with a lovely pose for our long drawing.

It felt good to be back in the studio drawing again.  

Many thanks to model Amelia for her inspiring poses!

Figure Drawing with Model Amelia

 

We returned to the studio for Osher Figure Drawing with model Amelia who brought us creative, curving poses twisted in unusual ways.

We started the day with 5-line drawings, selecting 5 lines to tell the story of Amelia's 1-minute poses.

We moved on to mass gestures, adding weighted lines and shadows. 

We finished the morning with one long pose. 

Many thanks to Amelia for her fantastic poses!

Osher Figure Drawing -- Portraiture with Model Robin

 An impromptu visit from my best friend, Robin, intersected with an ice storm that kept my scheduled portraiture model from being able to travel to my home studio, and the result was a wonderful class on drawing the face and head.

My dear friend stepped in to fill the gap, and we began with 1 minute gestures of the structure of Robin's head in various different poses -- looking up, looking down, presenting profile and front-on views.

We then took 2 minutes to create more developed gesture drawings of just Robin's head and neck, refining our sketches and adding in more details.

My final 2-minute drawing was beginning to look more like Robin.

I demonstrated how to draw the face and head in more detail including the placement of the features, and studies of each in the front-on view and in profile.

We finished up the session with a long pose of about an hour.

Many thanks to my dear friend, Robin!

Osher Figure Drawing with Model Amelia

This week's focus of study was dealing with the challenge of foreshortening.  We warmed up with Amelia taking contrapposto standing poses for us-- the classic standing twist. By drawing with a continuous line, we could explore interior and exterior contours, and with our drawing implement always in contact with the paper, we could spend more time looking at Amelia and less at our paper.

We moved on to 4-minute wrapped-line drawings.  Rather than following the outer contours of Amelia's form, we imagined we were mapping the path of an ant crawling back and forth across Amelia, and so created a contour drawing.  This technique helps to understand the landscape of a foreshortened limb.

Amelia's final gesture of the series was quite foreshortened, giving us a great opportunity to test what we had been practicing.

We moved on to a 15-minute study of foreshortening -- the challenge of drawing a limb coming directly towards us.

We finished the class with a long pose of about 50 minutes (with breaks of course), and incorporated foreshortening into the pose as well as interesting background elements. 

Many thanks to model Amelia for a fantastic session with amazing contrapposto poses!

Osher Figure Drawing with Kathryn

We had a wonderful first class of the semester on Friday with model Kathryn.  We began with 2-minute mass gesture drawings.

I invited my students to turn their charcoal on its side and make broad strokes to express the masses within Kathryn's form.  I find this technique a good way to warm up at the beginning of a term.  It also helps us to explore the structure within the body rather than just looking at outside contours.

We added a minute to the gesture poses, and included some contours and shadows to bring definition to our drawings.

Then we changed gears to a more abstract approach, and chose 5 lines to represent Kathryn's 1-minute poses.

Now that we were warmed up, we worked on some longer studies.

It was wonderful to be back to drawing, and to have Kathryn's fantastic poses to keep us creating!