August 2011: Straw Flowers and Paper Challenges

August 2011: Straw Flowers, a photo by apple-pine on Flickr.

This is one of the most colorful flower arrangements I've ever had - very fiery and very strong! I wanted to paint it very much.
But current sketchbook is giving me hard times with colors in it... And since I am in the mood to accept this challenge of 30 definitely not perfect pages, I decided to do several takes on the same subject. This is strictly black and white version. But I will try all sorts of alternatives in search for the best portrait of this fire and best technique with this slick and buckling paper. Stay tuned :)

Stuck Again? I Try to Slow Down...

July 2011: Palette, a photo by apple-pine on Flickr.

Whatever happens around me, slowing down and really really looking at things - and not on my paper helps me to get things in focus. Yes - it's tilted, curved and not exactly proportionate. But I had a very slow, very meditative time while drawing the contour. Plus a lot of fun splashing color all over it ;)

On being stuck.

This post is about me. I am stuck and not drawing after the holidays. But I am working through this - and wanted to share how :)

But first of all I would like to mention that image below shows you how I made a little book based on instructions I found on Keri Smith blog. She is incredibly inspiring and innovative author /illustrator/ guerrilla artist who wrote several books for reading and playing with. My favorite ones are living out loud and how to be an explorer of the world :) (Her books can move mountains and may be one day I can write separately about why and how they do this for me - but not today :).
Here is a link to her PDF on making this sort of book:
http://www.kerismith.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/magic_booksm.pdf

So here I am - three days without even a drop of ink in my sketchbook, feeling bad about this and realizing that I am not ready to draw through this (which is my usual way of dealing with emptiness of being stuck). Pages of my 5 x 8 book look intimidatingly large. I try to draw little square to draw in it as a start - but it looks too puny. On a whim I hide my book and decide to make a tiny journal - for right now - and fill it with 15 things that I see right this moment in front of me - on my table. And do it all in 15 minutes.

I took a page from my printer and - well here is what I did:

And then I drew whatever I saw:

Rightmost image shows you how this page looks like when I unfold the book. Hmm - may be I should try making a few of these and binding them together...
Anyways - not quite 15 things and all this took me less than 15 minutes - but I felt much better :) And I think I will glue/tape this in my sketchbook next to that puny square - which I am ready to draw in now ;)

Try it out!