Laurelines

Moving along: October

October has been a month of transitions. I moved past one big set of deadlines, slowed down a bit and made some really fun Inktober meanders. (Inktober means making an ink drawing for every day in October. I didn't make the daily goals, but I made several drawings throughout the month.)

Then I approached another deadline, did that work, and finally, here I am, ready for travel and trying out new materials and methods for painting and drawing. Will tell more about that later, but for now I'll just say that I'm really, really excited about these new directions for 2016!

And here are some of the Inktober forays. I learned to my delight that I can draw on my interior landscapes of the far north, of Iceland and Norway, and with a few strokes of ink and wash and resist, bring those numinous places to myself again!  It felt like magic!

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In a move of great counter-intuitiveness, I am going to a hot and dry place next week, to stay with an old friend and visit others. I'm so looking forward to the friends, but the heat... not so much.

December will find me running truer to form.  I'll be going to the Bavarian Alps, circling back to a well-loved place of my childhood.

I'll be back with sketches of that hot, dry place soon!

September was here

At least, I think it was. I mostly had my head down in the studio. However, I finished my two big summer projects yesterday, just as the month was about to turn. My three-sessions drawing classes at Duke University's Nasher Art Museum were wonderful far, far beyond expectations. My classes were completely booked, with a long waiting list and the participants were a varied, accomplished, and very fun group!  I am still basking in the glow of all that excitement!

We accomplished a lot. The students made blind contour drawings, modified blind contour drawings, gesture drawings, structural drawings, expressive drawings. I, unfortunately, failed to take photos of their work and I won't make that mistake again. Here are some demo drawings I made for the class:

 Blind contour drawing of a 16th C Saint Matthew

 

Modified blind contour and gesture drawing.

  

Expressive drawing of a fragment of a Roman sarcophagus, made with two colored pencils taped together, done in a modified blind contour technique. 

In all the drawings for this series, we emphasized process, not product. This was about freeing yourself and finding your own relationship with the subjects of your drawings and with yourself as artist.

I will show some of the paintings I did for the restaurant in Chicago once it opens, but here are just some of the gorgeous scraps and leavings I kept, after a summer of testing colors and composition on paper. These are a treasure for me for both my future paintings and illustrations. Exactly how they will be used remains to be seen and that is the very exciting part!

I have one more illustration to do this year, for the winter issue of Charleston Style & Design, due the end of October. Then I will take November and December off for travel, family, friends, and my own work. More about all that later. I feel so happy just thinking about that freedom and flexibility. Happy October to all of us!