Finally, sat down and did some sketching. I went out with my friend, Sharon, to a local bookstore for coffee, chit chat, and a bit of sketching. So glad I did! Good to get out and see a lovely friend, put a pen to paper, and just enjoy the time. Lately I have been caught up with potential evacuations from local fires and too much TV bingeing (A French Village on Amazon Prime) and photography. As a result, artwork has been put on hold. Now, I hope I have the whatever back, and will continue!
This is perhaps one of the first paintings – sketches? – that I have done since re-visiting watercolors a few weeks ago that does not depend on ink lines to make sense of what it is. It’s still floating in space, as the shadows are not especially strong. There are a few things I like here. One is how there is a highlight in the read of the mouse. Another is the central brownish panel on the side of the mouse, which is a mixture of carbazole violet and Naples yellow. The black outline of the mouse is in Daniel Smith’s Genuine Sodalite, which I picked up some time ago. It’s a rather nice blackish color. The blues in the background / foreground are from Daniel Smith’s Lapis Lazuli Genuine, which, like the sodalite, I picked up on a whim. It will be interesting to see how these two paints work.
I also set up my studio palette the other day, choosing a variety of colors to fill my Quiller palette. I did a color study and labeled all my colors, except one, which I think might be yellow ochre – or not!
Admittedly I have been feeling rather sorry for myself. I get like this when I have no time to sit down and think about life and what I want to do with it. Thursday I walked into my office at work and was just unable to make choices as to what to pursue next. Oh, there were a lot of things to be done, but it seemed just so overwhelming and the mere act of choosing what to do was impossible. The best thing to do in these circumstances – for me, at least – is to sit down with paper and pen and begin to write. Five pages later, the world was in order once more.
Writing is therapeutic. It’s like the pensieve of the Harry Potter stories. I pull out thoughts and ideas and frustrations, and when they are all placed onto paper, there is structure found amidst the chaos.
Painting is much the same process as writing; however, I often feel pulled into different directions. I never focus on one style. The consistent factor is my use of water-soluble media and paper, but other than that, I don’t have a particular style. Consequently, I am not as accomplished as I would like to be in watercolor. I like many of my ink paintings and the simpler watercolors that are based on sumi-e. Traditional watercolors are often disastrous failures. Acrylic paints are not my favorite medium, but there are times when I have used them to create more graphic pictures.
Today, I went through my hard drive to look at some of the paintings I have scanned or photographed over the past year or two, and pulled out some which appealed to me for whatever reason – sort of a retrospective of the work of the last few years. Here they are, not in any particular order, but just for me and anyone who wants to look at them to see and consider.
Yes, you read that heading right. Mouse-eating plant, not plant-eating mouse.
Redfern Natural History writes
New species discovered in the Phillipines!
During 2007, Alastair Robinson, Stewart McPherson and Volker Heinrich encountered a truly remarkable, giant new species of pitcher plant in the Philippines. This new plant is considered to be one of the largest of its kind, and has been named Nepenthes attenboroughii in honor of Sir David Attenborough.
This is a very cute picture, until you realize that this mouse really is lunch.
This link at CBS shows a lot of the pictures McPherson took, along with explanations. The BBC “Earth News” articles gives more information about the expedition and pitcher plants in general. Here you can learn a bit about the pitcher plant, and other carnivorous plants in general.
The world is a scary place at times . . . not just in the bad parts of town.
Ink, Yarn & Beer 