Hall dresser

I walk past this scene a gazillion times a day. Why then does it take so long to see the possibilities for a drawing?  One night in the reduced lighting it finally became clear to me... I like the result, although it is not as dark as the actual scene.  The notes on the drawing say only,"1/8/16    9:20 pm"   I guess I was concerned about resetting the scene on another night when I went to finish it.  I did not need to worry-  although most of it was done in greatly reduced lighting, once the main idea was on the paper, the rest did not need such careful reproduction of the scene.  Really, it did take me a few nights to finish it up, sometimes working on it only a few minutes for lack of time or motivation.

Bob's Windmill

Our neighbor, Bob, who has been a history buff much of his life, helped locate and install the windmill  on this private property.  The Civil War era Miller homestead miraculously survived Quantrill's raid in 1860's.  Lawrence was a hotbed of pre-civil war bickering.  Places like this are a great inspiration for a little bit of reflection about the days of "yester-year".             It has been a warm, wet winter. So what would usually be snow has mostly been rain. This day, near the end of the year, when it began to snow, I began to get antsy.  Soon I was in the pickup looking for a place to walk and draw.  This place has been waiting for just such a day I guess.  I could shield the small sketch pad with my body just enough to keep the extra fine sharpie working. They don't work well running in water!  Actually, I guess the snowfall was even less impressive than it appears in the painting. Some things are easy to exaggerate.  I did this watercolor directly from the ink drawing.   I think it worked ok.    Done on the 10th of January from the sketch of 12/28/15.   10" x 12" Canson 140# w/c paper.  Guess I should find the ink sketch to post as well, but as we are getting ready for a weeks trip, I do not have the time right now to look for it....

bug fence

The shadows were interesting.  So I had to do 'em.  The rest was kinda just where it went from there. It was in Warner Robins at the kids place.  There is always plenty to do when there is family around, so having time to sketch is not high on the priority list. More than once we sat out on this deck in the late evening with these things burning for protection from the few bugs, but we often were sitting out in cooler weather, when there really were no bugs.  Ink and graphite drawing in a 5" x 9" pad.

off season

This poor plant has been sitting on our cabinet all winter wishin' spring would come. It has a hole or 2 eaten in the leaves and a stub of a stem going nowhere. But the greens of the plant and the pot, and the white and black of the dish and handwork make for good contrast and subtle color variations.  Of course the stretch of the leaves to the side give the piece a sense of direction it might otherwise not have...
The plant is insignificant, but the handwork came from our parents
I think, and the octagonal bowl was given us by a neighbor.  The painting was done on the 23rd of January, or maybe finished that day.  It was done in a Canson Montval pad of a 9" x 12" format. This was the first use for me of this paper. I like the way it works, though the jury may be out on how quick it is, or how well it takes abuse.

Below are the preliminary studies which for some reason in this case I seem to have way overdone; I did some studies of the shape of the bowl, as well as of the overall layout and shading.

winter pots

Another quickie from Georgia.  These pots had been sitting all winter under a bench on the deck, waiting for the spring that had now arrived.  We did not get to stay long enough, though to see them put to use, but I am sure they were.  Now another Georgia trip is in the works. But the kids have moved from this place to one in the country with a little more room - and another kid I might add! This drawing is all ink, no pencil in a 5" x 9" pad.

Southbound

I have tagged this as "Rural Lawrence".  But what does that mean?  What was rural 30 years ago is town now.  This particular place sits surrounded by town, and waiting for development. All that still stands of the house is the fireplace. The rest went up in smoke...  I transferred the basics of the sketch to watercolor paper by hand then did this painting. That was a couple days after the sketch below.

Here is the sketch, done in a 9" x 5" pad. I did this on a Saturday I was remembering, but I see the notes say Monday.  I had been visiting the park across the road sometimes for some birding or sketching. This day I walked south near the road and got this sketch.  A good sketch has half a chance of turning into something.  You can see from the notes that I did not include them in the painting- nor use them in the name...  You can also see the paint splashes on the sketch from when I was doing the painting. When the sketch is close enough to the painting to refer to it is also close enough to get a bit of color added to it...    This was it. I did no other sketches or studies, before jumping right into the painting.