Laurelines

More from Barcelona: a market, a mammoth

The Boqueria Market in Barcelona is the most spectacular such market I've ever seen. It is immense and lively and colorful, brimming with fresh produce, fish, meat, spices, confections, pastries, and copious amounts of other specialties of the region. If you can eat it or drink it, and it was made locally, you'll find it there. My sketches only give tiny peeks, including this large EEL, (in Catalan,'el congrio'), dominating a fishmonger's stall, into the cornucopia that is Boqueria. For more info click on this link.

   The mammoth in the bottom sketch (click for bigger)  was my plan B for the day. I'd intended to sketch the large fountain at Parc de la Ciutadella, but when I got there, I found it covered in scaffolding.  I used a new orange pen I found at an art supply store in the old town----it's not my fave, as it turns out. (It helps to blame your art supplies when things go awry while sketching.)

Cindy Woods, passionate artist and courageous voyager

Our dear friend Cindy Woods died this afternoon, peacefully and on her own terms, after an on-again, off-again seven-year battle with oral cancer. She heroically endured months of chemo and radiation, the invasion of her body by numerous tubes and attachments, and the prospect of more to come until Monday, when she said, 'enough.'  The same explorer's spirit with which she documented in her drawings the world around her, that impelled her in recent years to take numerous trips with her devoted friend Ronda to New York and elsewhere, on the trail of great art, music, good food and joy, made her want to face death directly, with resolve and strength of heart. I have an image of her climbing to her fate as if it were Mount Kilimanjaro, planting her flag at the summit, triumphantly claiming the destination as her own. Cindy Woods---artist, conqueror, beloved friend.

Barcelona trip sketches are here!

We had a grand time in Spain--- my first visit. Barcelona reminds me of southern French cities and towns I've been to, which is not surprising since it is about three inches away from the French border. Well, five inches.  It is a lovely, laid-back, slightly gritty, place.
My favorite things about Barcelona were the magnificent food market, the mercat de la Boqueria, the best I've seen in Europe for sheer variety, quantity, beauty, and Gaudi's Parc Guell. That Gaudi---I'd like some of what HE was having.
Here's the first installment of this trip's sketches. More to come.

An Italian fountain in Austin---what else?

Here I was this weekend, in the midst of the gorgeous Texas capital of Austin, surrounded by succulents, cacti, red tile roofs, big blue sky, Spanish-influenced architecture and aesthetic, and so on, and what do I gravitate towards? An Art Deco fountain, created by the Italian born sculptor Pompeo Coppini!  As you may know, I've got a thing for fountains and water. Mind you, I had only a scant day and a half there on a trip with my daughter C. I would have drawn other, more typically Austinian things, I'm sure, had I had more time! (Click on images to see detail.)
I do have another chance soon to address Spanish subject matter, though---I leave for Barcelona this Wednesday with my husband, back in a week. The trip is his birthday present from me. I hear they have fountains in Barcelona ;D. And Gaudis and Picassos and gardens and flamenco dancers and.... .

Hasta la vista!

Spanish faces

In between helping my daughter K through a trying postpartum period and before going with my daughter C to Austin, Texas, at the end of this week, I snatched a late afternoon, by myself, to go see a fabulous exhibit of Spanish art in the reign of Philipp III at the Nasher Museum. The show was curated by my friend Sarah Schroth and she is to be knighted by Spain for her great work! (What do you call a female knight, I wonder?)
Anyway,  I made some quick sketches and later added color to one of them. Though I had seen El Grecos in person before, I had not seen his work displayed so intensively and so sensitively as they were here.  I was stunned again, and more than ever before, by the power of his brushwork, by the brilliant idiosyncrasy of his draughtsmanship, and by the 'modernity' of his technique. It is obvious his influence MADE Picasso the painter he became.  So there. There were works by many other painters ( and some sculptors), including one of my all-time favorites 'The Immaculate Conception' by Velazquez.
Anyway, here are my sketches, late additions to my 101 Faces Project!