I think I'm done with this one...

I say "I think" because I'll probably mess with it before I stick it in an envelope. But I'm thinking that I should spray this and mail it today, so I can stop feeling like I'm getting behind. But hey, I have 6 months, so I'm not behind at all. I have a good start on a bunch of others and I only need to create 20, so I'll be fine. But I do need to let this one go. I used Bristol Vellum by mistake, so it gets smeary very easily. You know how I prefer Bristol smooth, unless I'm drawing something with rough, wrinkly hide.

In other news, it's funny how last night I was feeling envious of New York's winter storm. I know, I know--I always complain about snow, but if I lived in New York, I wouldn't drive, so winter storms would be fine. And I did have fun being snowed in this year. It's really only fun for a day or two though, because then you're itching to get out. You can only make so many loaves of bread and so many brownies before you feel like you want to get up and move and burn the brownies and bread off. That's all for today. I know I haven't been around much lately. I hope to be back regularly soon. I have still been drawing. I just haven't been posting.

A bit of summer...

I thought I would post this sunflower painting that I painted several months ago, but never posted. This one I gave away to Jane. This time of the year, I am so sick of white and gray and brown that a bit of color in the surroundings would be good. The other day someone was going on about how she thought that cold sunny days were the prettiest. I do not. Even though I was just going on about how we could use a bit of color, I just don't think the sun goes well with snow. In addition to hurting my eyes, it clashes and the light is too harsh and brassy, sort of like badly dyed blonde hair. White usually looks fine with most colors, but not with yellow light. I think cloudy winter days are the prettiest. I like the contrast between the snow and the sky and the peaceful feeling that brings. In fact, the best is when it is dark and it is snowing and you can see the snow sparkling under the street lights or in the moonlight. Cloudiness and night time go better with the snow. I know we need the sun in the winter and it does feel good, but don't try to tell me that it is so pretty. It's really not very attractive at all. You would never see me wearing yellow with white and I don't even like to look at yellow and white together. So there...

Portrait of a Lady with a Unicorn

Again with the literal names. I decided to try a post card size Master's copy today. We can do either 2.5x 3.5 inch or postcard size (4x6). I think postcard size lends itself better to this particular project. I've done masters copies in the tiny size before and they have turned out well, but I think I'm going to do more postcard sized this time. I got my first card in the mail yesterday and it is the larger size. I guess that's what inspired me to give it a shot. The painting this was based on is attributed to Raphael(although there is some doubt that he actually painted it). If it has a bit of a Mona Lisa quality to it, I guess that may be because he was a contemporary of Leonardo DaVinci. I did a tiny bit of research on him and discovered that he died when he was only 37. Considering that, it's rather impressive how large of a body of work he left behind. This painting is thought to be of a girl from a wealthy family who had recently been betrothed as the unicorn represents purity.



I may work on it more, adding some darks here or there or I may just leave it light and sketchy. I just want to keep it soft and I'm afraid of overworking it. As you can see, it is not an exact likeness or anything. The idea is just to base your drawings or paintings on the originals, not to do an exact replica. I know I said yesterday that I was going to do pictures of people reading, but then i checked out a bunch of art books last night and changed my mind.

Anyway, not much else to say. I'm just hanging out at home with the cats today.

I'm not bored...

I did a quick sketch this morning of Corot's "Woman Reading a Book." That is a very fitting title, I might add. A lot of paintings have literal names like that: Woman Walking a Dog, Boy Eating Cereal, Baby Spitting Up, etc. Those aren't real names by the way, but they could be. I have decided that I am going to have a theme for the ATC trade and that will be paintings of people reading. I have done a few that don't fit in that category, but the rest that I do will. I got a desk lamp for Christmas, so now it will be easier to do colored pencil drawings at night, so I think I will do mostly colored pencil work for the project. The lighting in my place has never been good for night time colored pencil work, but now it is.

Anyway, to explain my title, I will start by saying that I'm not bored. Sometimes when I'm stuck inside in the winter, I wish I could be doing something else, but I'm still not bored. I have a college aged co-worker who is on winter break at the moment and she keeps going on and on about how bored she is. That doesn't happen to me anymore. In fact, I wish we had 48 hour days. There is too much to do. There are way too many books to read (and people just keep writing more!), pictures to draw, things to learn, to do, to see, etc etc. I am not bored... Am I lucky that I feel this way?

letter to the ants

Dear Ants,

Mi casa no es su casa. What do you think my place is? Your winter vacation home? If you're going to visit my apartment without an invitation, would you please stick to eating crumbs on the floor. Do not, under any circumstances, march up my table cloth onto my table and help yourself to the fruit in the fruit bowl. I'm not at all wealthy and apples are not cheap. I do not appreciate it when I pick one up, ready to bite into it's juicy goodness, only to discover that it is full of holes filled with your kind, having a snack. At least the box elder bugs have the decency to not burrow into the fruit. Yuck is all I can say. It's not only disgusting, but horrifying and sure to give me nightmares. Moreover, it is theft. If a person breaks into my apartment ands starts eating my apples, I will call the police. Who do I call when ants break in and take what is mine? Maybe it's time to take the law into my own hands and invest in some Taro. Yes, death may seem like a severe punishment for apple theft, but I have had enough of your lack of respect and it's time to take action.

Sincerely,
Anti-ant Anne

Just playing around with Zazzle

I know making ones own stamps is nothing new, but I found out you can do it at zazzle.com, so I just decided to play around with it. Considering that I only mail one envelope per month (my rent), I don't use very many stamps, but it would be fun to use designs of my own. If I have some printed, it would be hard to decide what image I want on them, but these are just a few examples of what I might use.

Edited to add that I have decided to have a sheet of these printed for my ATC trade since I need stamps anyway. I'm trying to decide which one of these to use. I may play around with more images, but for now, these are my options.

Edited again to add that people on Facebook have unanimously voted for red mittened guy, but I'm wondering if his colors make him look Christmasy? I only want wintery. Christmas is over.

Rosie Rhino again

So, I know I've drawn this particular pose countless times, but I wanted to try it on a different surface, that being Bristol vellum. I usually use Bristol smooth and I love Bristol smooth, but I just wanted to give this a try. The fact of the matter is, I have always had a bit of a prejudiced attitude toward Bristol vellum. Some experienced artists were talking about it online one day and were saying that it's worthless. I sort of agreed with them at the time, not having used it much, but then I drew a portrait on Bristol vellum. And despite the fact that it was very smeary, I really liked the portrait. In fact, I have to say it is one of my favorite portraits that I have done. So, I had to rethink Bristol vellum. Or I should say that I should have rethought Bristol vellum as I didn't really rethink it. I just continued to ignore it. But today I thought I'd like to try it again and I have to say that it really is suitable for pachyderms. It has more surface or more tooth than Bristol vellum, so it is easier to render rough wrinkly hide. I am really thinking that this may be the surface that I should use for my rhino illustrations.

So, along with my rough illustration, I am also going to post some rough writing. And i mean rough as it is a first draft that was written quickly, but I will post it because I keep losing the good stuff. I was inspired one day at work and I wrote some rhyme on a long, skinny piece of paper. This writing was really good and I told myself not to lose it. I kept it on my c.d. shelf in my bedroom for the longest time. It kept falling on the floor and I kept picking it up telling myself "you have to get this in the computer because one of these days it is going to disappear for good." Did I run to type it out just then? No, I did not and, in the end, I did lose it for good. And it was good. The one thing I do remember clearly about it is that I rhymed "elocution" and "revolution." I will make sure that I do that again.

Anyway, I will post the rough writing here. I will either try to improve it or scrap it entirely, but at least it is here, in cyberspace, so I will not lose it. Here it is:


When Rosie lost her fourth galosh,
After she had a good cry,
She decided that she would constantly pose
With her forth leg hidden from the eye.

How long did this charade continue?
How long did she live with this lie?
Well, she gave up the practice within minutes,
When Hornelius spied her bare hoof with his bad eye.

From there she fumed and she kicked and she growled.
She tossed her nubbed horn in the air.
With a temper more befitting a black rhino
Than a sweet white rhino with one hoof bare.

Obviously my illustration is her when she is posing with her one leg hidden from the eye, not when she as fuming and kicking and growling.

Paintings gone Awry

More often than not, when I try to paint with watercolors it all goes awry and I end up overdoing things and the painting becomes muddy. The top painting here is no exception. I didn't really work with the watercolors. I think I tried too hard to control them. I think with watercolors (which I really don't know much about), you can't fight with the medium. You have to go with the flow. This watercolor landscape was attempted from a step by step demonstration in a book. Sometimes I feel like I need to try step by step demonstrations, but it rarely works for me. I'm then too conscious of following the steps and I don't really "see." Drawing and painting is all about seeing and step by step sort of takes away from the big picture, I think. Anyway, this painting is not good, but that's o.k.. I tried. Practice always makes better. Maybe I'll try another watercolor landscape without the hindrance of step by step instructions. In my defense, I do have to say that the sky is o.k.. That's the one part that didn't become muddy.

And as for the abominable snow monster (acrylics), even though he's not abominable, he's not the best either. And I'm not saying this in a kick myself sort of way. I'm just being honest and pragmatic. He was actually painted on the day of our big snowstorm about a month ago (yes, I got inspired by the arctic whiteness outside my window. As annoying as the snowstorm was, it was also magical, as snow can be), but I never scanned him or thought about posting him until tonight. But since I decided to make this post about paintings gone awry, I thought I would include him. Even though I felt inspired at the time, he just didn't turn out in the way I envisioned. That happens sometimes. My abominable snow monster figure that I used for the painting is still standing on my dresser. I love him so much more than this painting. I think my main problem with the painting is my failure to render the fur well. I just haven't worked out a good way of doing fur in acrylics yet. It seems that I'm always painting pachyderms, so I haven't had a lot of fur practice. I do, however, like the way his arms and hands turned out. And I did capture the abominable snow monster attitude, I suppose;) I guess I can always find something slightly positive, even in the paintings that I'm not overly fond of.

I spent most of the day as a bit of a slug. I started things off in a productive way as I made bread and rearranged my book shelf in the morning, but I didn't do much after that. I've been head achy and stomach achy most of the day, but I'm not really sick--just experiencing a bit of malaise. It happens to us hearty types once in awhile.

In other news, I should mention that I like my new scanner. I don't seem to have to do as much color or brightness contrast adjustment as I did before. And that's all I have for you tonight. My general malaise and I are going to sign off and be slugs for the rest of the night. Blogging was too taxing for us.

It's cold

It's cold outside and my hair is still wet. I am hoping that it will be mostly dry before I go outside. I don't like to go outside with wet hair. My rhinosnowman has no hair, so he doesn't have to worry about having wet hair outside. He is made of snow anyway, so he cold is to his benefit.

I almost forgot that I had signed up for an ATC trade that started on January 1st. Until this morning, I hadn't done an ATC in ages. For anyone who doesn't remember me talking about ATCs before, they are artist's trading cards and they measure just 2 1/2 x 3 1/2 inches. Yes, they are teeny tiny. This ATC trade is an Old Master trade, meaning that we have to make ATCs that are copies of or inspired by Old Master's paintings. This morning, I started a copy of a close-up of the face of Venus from Boticelli's Birth of Venus. Unfortunately, all of my .5 mechanical pencils appear to be not working and I'm pretty sure I left my last good one up north. Mechanical pencils go awry quite easily. I can't advance the graphite in any of my .5s and I have a bunch of .7s that are having the same problem. I think they must get clogged up somehow, but I haven't figured out how to unclog them. I think they're meant to just be disposable.

Phoebe's new favorite spot...

What would cats do without the warmth of technology?

Right Handed Faces

Hello. It's me again. I have just done a quick page of right handed sketches. These are a little better than the left handed sketches, but they were done quickly, so we still don't have perfect little faces here. It is much easier to draw with my dominant hand. I'm certainly not ambidextrous.

If you look closely, you might be able to see that I repeated a couple of the faces from the left handed exercise.

Left handed faces

So, as I promised, I am going to try to draw almost every day. Tonight's drawings are kind of crazy kooky looking as I drew them with my non dominant hand. It's amazing how difficult it is to draw with my left hand, yet I do like the faces' sort of deranged, expressive quality. I find that if I write letters with my left hand, they have to be upper case, otherwise it is way too confusing. I think it's because lower case letters have a lot more curves and it's more difficult, for some reason, to draw curves in the right direction with the non dominant hand than it is straight lines. I wonder why that is? I should mention that these were scanned with my new scanner! My carpet was dry in my computer desk area, so the desk is back in its place and everything is reconnected, including new scanner/printer (well, in its case, connected).

Goodbye 2010

Happy New Year, everyone. I will start the year with one of my rhinosnowmen.

I wasn't overly fond of 2010 and even though I don't think a new year magically transforms the world at large or our place in it, I'm not sorry to see it go. So, goodbye 2010. So long. I'm not one for New Year's resolutions. Not that I think I'm perfect or anything, but I've always been a bit of contrarian, so if I'm going to resolve to do something it won't be on a day when people are just spouting out empty promises that they rarely stick to. And I think if a person actually wants to do something and they work hard it they will achieve some level of success (I don't mean success in the form of money, but success in achieving some level of what they set out to do that will give them some satisfaction). People are full of excuses, aren't they? I don't always do what I set out to do, but I know, for the most part, I don't have anybody to blame but myself if I don't stick to something. So, if I don't do something, I take responsibility. As much as I don't like resolutions, I think I've said it before, small goals, achievable goals, are something that I will partake in at times. I'm just not going to list them on January 1st as they may seem like a New Year's resolutions. Am I grouchy right now?;) No, not really. I just get annoyed with New Year's resolutions, that's all. Sue me. But if you do sue me, you will not get much money.

One of the goals that I've set recently (o.k., I will mention one that wasn't made on January 1st) is to get back into drawing several times per week. I used to draw just about every day and now whole weeks go by when I don't even pick up a pencil (true as in why would I use a pencil if I wasn't drawing--a pen maybe, but not a pencil). And I could make excuses like "oh I haven't been drawing because I haven't had a scanner, etc," but that wouldn't be true. I can still enjoy the process of drawing even if I'm not posting it on a blog, can't I? The truth is I haven't been drawing because I've been a bit lazy lately. And there's nothing wrong with being lazy once in awhile (I'm not of the mind that a person has to run run run), but when you have an activity that you love, you shouldn't let laziness interfere too much. And you might say, "but you've done paintings lately." Yes, I have, so I haven't been totally lazy even, but I just want to do some drawing now. As for the drawing I did today, I will not post it as I haven't hooked up my new scanner yet, due to flooding in the bedroom, but hopefully I will be posting all kinds of drawing in the days to come.

I made some delicious bread today. It is English muffin bread with corn meal. What I really wanted was corn bread, but I only have olive oil in my cupboard. While olive oil can be substituted for vegetable oil in some recipes, I'm thinking the flavor may be a bit too strong for corn bread. Anyway, I found a way to make a sort of cornbread in the bread machine. I added more corn meal and less flour to the recipe to make it more corn flavored and it turned out great.

Edited to add, I just noticed that I really need to update my Goodreads bookshelf. I finished "Outliers" and "Mockingjay" ages ago, although I suspect I will be working on "A Suitable Boy" for quite some time. The problem is when I'm reading a book that long, I need to take breaks from the long book and read books that I can actually finish quickly, so then it takes longer to finish the long book.