Happy Sunday

I'm taking a class with Jane Davenport from Australia. The second picture here is my interpretation of her in a teaching video she made from Bali. She's teaching how to use various tools from colored pencil to watercolors and markers. We are also learning how to draw faces and some basic figures. I'm learning quite a bit. The other picture here is one of my lessons in putting it together in my journal.

The picture of Jane was done with regular graphite pencil on a gesso covered puzzle page in a re-purposed journal. I went over the pencil with watercolor pencils and then water.

The girl with kite was done with no drawing for the background. I just took gouache (opaque watercolor) and started in. Then I drew the girl on a separate piece of paper, colored it in with colored pencil, cut her out and glued her on the page. I'm really happy with her and my whole page!

I hope these pictures add some color to your day. Hope you have a great Fall Sunday!

If you are interested in Jane's classes check out this link: http://www.janedavenport.com/workshops/ . You'll learn a lot and have fun too. This is the beginning workshop; she's planning more to help us with drawing people!

Sambo and another Portrait

Still keeping busy with artstuff. I had put the background to Sambo in ahead of time. It's acrylic so watercolor wouldn't work well and I didn't feel like using gouache or collage so I used the Tombow pen to draw my little black poodle-chihuahua mix. I like how he turned out. I guess I could have drawn him larger but it's okay this way. At least I got him down before he moved! Getting faster with my sketching and that's a good thing when you try to get an animal down without using a photo.

The other is portrait number 9. I'm really slow at doing these. The challenge was to do one every day during the month of August but I've changed it to doing 30 no matter how long it takes! I'm pretty happy with this one although once again, it doesn't look like me or the other portraits! My eyes are too big but at least I got the head shape better. And the nose is better too! Wish it looked like me though!

Everyone ready for fall to come? I've had enough of this summer between snakes and the heat. I think everyone has had lots of heat this year and many of you got Irened too. I hope all of you did okay through her rage up the East Coast.

Mojave Green and Some More Self-Portraits

Oh, we had some excitement around our house this morning. Not good excitement either. I looked out about 15 minutes after I'd let two of our remaining dogs outside and this is what I saw. At first I couldn't believe I was seeing what I was so I called my husband over and he confirmed it. Another snake! This is a Mojave Green rattler which has two kinds of toxins, one for the muscles and one for the nervous system so the vaccines and antivenoms don't work well if a dog gets bit. Very, very dangerous. This one had 7 rattle buds so it was quite mature. At least we got this one before it got another of our dogs!

The other pictures are part of my ongoing self-portrait series with Violette
. I am not happy with my monkey face at all. My face needed to be out as far as the hair edges and then hair added beyond that. It would have made a lot of difference. Also, I think I have to watch the angle at which I hold a handheld mirror as it changed perspective on me and not for the better! Ah well, it's a learning process.

The second, blue and orange picture was done in ball point pen with watercolor added. I was trying to stay cool yesterday which I can as long as I stay indoors with the air-conditioning but it was 108 degrees outside. The official temp is never as high as we seem to get but we have three thermometers outside that all say the same thing. They are two different brands and in three areas of the yard so can they all be wrong? I think not. These were portraits nos. 7 and 8. I am quite a bit behind but that's okay with me. It's the journey, not the speed that counts here.

Hope you have happy events in your day!

Are You Being Watched?

 My kitty was sitting beside me while I played a game on the computer.  I dropped the game and picked up a pencil to see how much I could draw before she moved.  Well, I got most of her eyes done and then she was gone.  Still, it made a nice page.  I went back in and added color to the eyes.  I don't know which way I like the drawing better.  What about you?