August 30 Figure Drawing

Above is last nights figure drawing. I am not overly happy with it. I had a hard time with her face and am still not happy with the result. Not my best work. My excuse is that I was tired, I hadn't slept all that well the night before. I think I need to work on my drawings more this week.

It is going to be hot hot hot, here today, for the 2nd day in a row, actually I think it is supposed to be hot for the rest of the week, hot is temps in the 90's, though I have to admit that the apt. didn't get that hot yesterday, so for me it wasn't too bad. The only plus side of this heat is that the humidity isn't 100%, which makes it a bit easier to bear.  Still since it was nice and cool last week I know I am not the only one who was hoping the 90 degree temps were over for the season. Oh well, tomorrow is Sept. 1st so summer is almost over and the high temps should be moving out.

Here on the eastern seaboard we are all keeping an eye on Earl, currently a category 4 hurricane. It has been quite a few years since we had a hurricane come ashore here in MA, and I am really hoping that all we get from Earl is a good drenching. Should know a bit more later today and definitely by tomorrow what Earl's track will be. If Earl does end up tracking to make landfall here in MA. it will hopefully have lost some strength. We have had some bad storms in the past few years so with luck it won't be as damaging as Gloria was way back in 1985.

My second drawing for you today is from my sketchbook, and is a sketch done from a photo I took down at the Cape Cod Canal park area. A man riding a bicycle on the pathway. It is pretty sketchy, but I am trying to do more compositional pieces such as figure groupings and landscapes with people. I am getting fairly good with single portraits or figures, human or animal, and think it is time to try and do more complex compositions.

That is it for today, I will post my latest Sketchbook project page in a couple of days since I finally colored in my Hermit Crab. I also have a new ATC card to show off. In the meantime comments are welcome.

August 24 Drawing

Not a good photograph, sorry about that, but it is raining here, which is actually a good thing, but it makes it hard for me to get a good photograph. Still I think the photo is good enough for you to get the idea of last nights drawing. If it looks like the model is asleep, that is because she was. Fortunately she mainly held pose, moving only toward the end of the session, but by then I pretty much had finished the body so I focused on rendering the drapes and sofa around her.

I probably should have moved as my location showed the body seriously foreshortened, but I decided to take it as a challenge and see what I could do with the pose. Needless to say it was a much easier pose from a straight on view.  But that is where the serious painters are usually located, and I don't like to get in their way. Still part of the purpose of these drawing sessions is to see how well I can do with challenging positions.

Again I only did the one drawing. I am taking the colored pencils with me, but focusing on getting a good graphite drawing, letting the colored pencils just sit for the moment. I think I will eventually go back to them when I feel I don't need to labor quite so much over the pencil drawings. This one took a lot of erasure before I felt I had things pretty much in the right place and in the right proportions. The advantage of using good paper is I can pretty much erase what I don't like without it leaving behind a shadow I don't want. I have been doing these drawings on Cranson 90lb classic cream drawing paper. It has a light tooth, takes the pencil well, erases well and is a nice weight. In a way I would rather be using a whiter paper, but I haven't found white paper in a pad in the size and weight I want to use.

When I started posting drawings from the live model sessions I was posting 2 drawings - one in graphite and one colored pencil drawing, since I am only doing the one image I was thinking that I would upload a 2nd image from the sketches I have been doing in my sketchbook during the week. For these drawings I am usually working from photos, ones I have made myself, or downloaded, or even from magazines. I try to vary the subject, some portraits, some animals, or even a landscape or two. The one I have for you this week is an animal drawing made from a photograph I made at the Chicago Lincoln Park Zoo. The rabbit was in the outdoor enclosure for the Gorillas. The keepers as part of the enrichment program the Zoo maintains for the Gorillas toss peanuts around the grass for them to find and eat. This rabbit was trying to collect his share of the bounty. Since the Gorillas don't like sharing this is rather risky behavior on the part of the rabbit. Do you think it looks nervous?

That is it for this post. Per usual comments are welcome.

Artist Trading Cards (ATC's)

Red Bird

ATC's or Artist Trading Cards are small works (3.5 x 2.5 inches) that are traded among artists. They can be sold, but then they are called ACEO's (Artist  Trading Card Editions and Originals)  The cards have been around since the late 90's and seem really popular with the altered art and stamper communities. I can understand why, collage is a much faster/easier way to make a lot of cards then what I have been doing. You can read some history about the cards here, and find instructions on how to make them here. Art Quilters have also taken to the small format and trading concept. The cards are the size of traditional baseball cards and as far as I can tell can be made with any materials the artist prefers, as long as the cards remain thin enough to slip into standard card sleeves they can be embellished with beads, fiber or other materials.  How much embellishment is permissible is sometimes predetermined in swaps that are set up along with a theme. Trades of cars were originally supposed to be done in person, artist to artist. Swap meets in some major cities were arraigned and held. But it is now several years on, and while swapping is still done face to face, I bet more cards are swapped through the mail. I know there are Yahoo groups set up for swapping and I have found at least one web site, ATCsforAll.com

I don't remember when I first heard about the cards, a few years ago anyway, I know they were swapped one year at the Chicago Quilt Festival. I have a friend who was making and sending fiber post cards, but I didn't find the post card size all that tempting though I did think about it off and on. A member of the Quilt Art list mentioned in a message that she had been making some ATC's for a Charity auction/fund raiser and was willing to trade with other list members who had made some. The message was the push I had been lacking to do some more investigating into how to make the cards and to finally get off my duff and make some.

First I did some on-line research (see links above) then I needed to decide what media I wanted to use for my first attempts. I decided that for my first cards I would use Bristol board, ink and colored pencils, the media that I have been playing with most for the past year or so. 

The Bristol board part was easy, I have several pads of it in various sizes. I used the cutter I purchased for making my Resume books to slice the paper into the required 3.5 x 2.5 inches. Next I had to decide what to draw on the card. I went browsing among my photo collection and found an image of a cardinal sitting on a bare branch that I thought looked doable. The result is the image at the top of the blog. Next photo is of my cut card stock and of the 3 cards I have so far finished. One card is flipped over showing the back where the artist writes  their name, contact information, and ATC number (can be either consecutive for all cards made or if a series the number in the series). I have added the work title, date, month/year and media I used to make the card. But I gather that the last 3 aren't required. 

So far I have finished 3, and I am not sure how many more I will finish before I am lured off to another project. I really should be working on my challenge quilt. But I fear I have gotten a bit bored with the handwork I need to do. Oh well. Here are photos of my other 2 finished cards, one is a mythical city that I just had fun drawing first with pen and then coloring in with colored pencils, the other is from a photo I made of pansy's that were offered for sale.

That is it for this post. Tomorrow evening I will dash out between expected rain drops to another drawing session, hopefully the results will be as good as last weeks.  Until the next post comments are welcome.