SF Bernal Heights Sketchcrawl, ink, watercolor, gouache, 7.5 x 11″
When it was time to leave for the Sketchcrawl in San Francisco I couldn’t find my sketch kit containing all my favorite sketching tools. I scoured the studio and the house. No sketch kit. I feared I’d left it at my figure drawing class the day before at the community college where it had probably already been adopted by a needy art student. Sad and frustrated, I cobbled together some pens, pencils, brushes and paints, threw them in a bag and drove across the Bay Bridge to San Francisco.
Catching up with my friend Susan Cornelis who came down from Sebastopol for the day, and connecting with some other local sketch buddies helped me forget about my missing precious pens and paints for a little while. Since I was so late, after a quick walk around the neighborhood, I decided to sketch what I could see from a bench on the porch in front of the library where the final meet up would be. The lamp post in the sketch above was up on the porch too, which is a little confusing perspective-wise, being up about 8 steps from the sidewalk in this hilly neighborhood.
The good news is that I had a great time at the sketch crawl AND the next day when I was getting ready to go out to the studio I picked up the basket I use to carry things back and forth from house to studio and my sketch kit was in the basket! YAY! And I put a “Reward for return” note in the bag with my name and phone number on it in case it ever disappears again.
I think I like the sketch better broken into two separate ones (below). What do you think?
SF Bernal Heights Sketchcrawl (crop 1) ink and watercolor in XL WC Moleskine
SF Bernal Heights Sketchcrawl (crop2) ink and watercolor in XL WC Moleskine
Brazilian Room, Tilden Park, Watercolor, 22 x 30 in
When I received an email from a woman in Switzerland, asking if I’d be interested in a commission to paint the site of her wedding (the Brazilian Room in Tilden Park) as a 10-year anniversary gift for her husband I said an enthusiastic, “Yes!” We agreed I would have the painting completed when she visited the Bay Area a couple of months later so that she could hand carry it back to Switzerland.
Brazilian Room, Tilden Park, Original Photo Reference
I visited the site, took photos and we agreed I would use the one above as reference for the painting. Since I shot the photo in late spring it wouldn’t really match the colors and light of her August wedding so I also used my imagination and memory of the park in summer to capture the warmth and strong light of August in the Bay Area. Below are some of the steps in the painting process.
Stege Marsh, ink and colored pencils in pocket Moleskine
I started to title this post “Change is Good” and then I thought, yeah, but change can be difficult too. As I thought of all the things change is (hard, exciting, scary, growth) I realized that if nothing else, change is constant, it just IS; thus the title.
So what about change? Well, the most obvious change is my blog’s appearance. I’ve begun the process of converting it to a website that will host both this blog, JanasJournal.com, and my art portfolio website, now at JanaBouc.com. It’s a work in progress so please, if you notice any bugs, let me know.
The sketch of Stege Marsh above reflects another change in my life; it’s one of the first sketches I did while out walking my pup. I waited until after we’d walked about 3 miles through the huge off-leash dog park at Pt. Isabel (well I walked 3 miles, she was off leash and probably ran 10 miles running off and coming back). By the time we got to this spot she was happy to rest while I sketched this view along the Bay Trail. I carry a little bag of colored pencils and a small Moleskine sketch book in my bag all the time as it’s lighter than my watercolor kit for long walks so that’s what I used to color in the ink drawing.
This little fig tree has survived so much: being transplanted, then a killer frost, and then transplanting again after sewer line work. As soon as leaves sprouted this year so did two figs. Sadly the crows or squirrels (or the toddler next door?) took them before I could even post this.
Little Rose Studies, ink and watercolor, 7.5×5.5 in
I sat in the driveway and quickly sketched some roses but had to stop when the shadow of the house took away the light.
End of Journal Self-Portrait, graphite, 5×7.5 in
And then there’s my not so spring-y self, frowning into the mirror, with hat-head and something wrong with the mouth. And yes, it’s intentionally buried at the bottom of this post. It feels good to be drawing again, after what seems like months away from it. It’s also a little frustrating feeling rusty at it. But the only fix for that is more drawing!
Christina’s Garden-Echinacea, ink and watercolor, 5×7 in
While the rest of the country is dealing with icy cold, we’re having a warmer-than- summer winter in Northern California. Instead of hunkering down and getting “rainy-day” tasks done at the computer I’m out walking for hours every day in the 72 degree sunshine with my pup. I love it but I miss winter!!!
Christina’s Garden 3: Kangaroo Paws, ink and watercolor, 5×7 in
Although these flowers were sketched in a friend’s beautiful garden during the actual summer months of 2013, my roses are still blooming and spring flowers and fruit tree blossoms are bursting out everywhere, despite the lack of rain. It’s weird to see brown dry hills in January.
Christina’s Garden 1, ink and watercolor, 5×7 in
Every day I look at the weather report, hoping to see rain in the near future, but it’s just not there. They’re saying this may be the driest year in 500 years. I read it’s already the driest winter in California recorded history. Since last winter ended I think all we’ve had are 2 days of minimal drizzles.
Until we get some winter weather, my semi-drought of blog posting will probably continue along with the sunshine that pulls me outdoors and away from the computer.
Birdwatching at Albany Bulb 1, ink and watercolor, 5×7 in
While I was having my car’s oil changed at Toyota Albany I took a hike down to the SF Bay Trail to sketch. I followed a confusing bike and walking path that goes up onto an overpass and then down under the freeway. It leads to the marsh on the way out to Albany Bulb, a spit of land homesteaded by the homeless that the city is constantly trying to reclaim. There were birds everywhere, including the beautiful, delicate white Snowy Egrets that always delight me (above).
Pigeons on the Freeway, ink and watercolor, 5×7 in
I even spotted birds living right on the freeway walls; the family of pigeons above didn’t seem disturbed by the constant roar of cars. The hike was a bit isolated, and it felt spooky walking under the freeways, even on a sunny weekday morning. Fortunately the few people I saw along the way were polite bicyclists. No trolls living under these bridges like the Brothers Grimm fairytale I remember with horror from my childhood.
Birdwatching at Albany Bulb, ink, 5×7 in
While I was sketching, a man was photographing birds nearby and he told me the names of the birds we were seeing, and how to differentiate them. I made notes on my sketch as I tried to figure out the basic shape of the birds.
World Journal News Box at Clark Kerr, ink/watercolor, 7x5x5.5 in
Although cold autumn weather and even snow already arrived in much of the western hemisphere, always radical Berkeley begs to differ. We had an unusually unfoggy and warm summer, a toasty fall, and now, with temperatures in the 70s we’re back to summer again. So far 2013 is the driest year in Bay Area history with less rain than any year in recorded history, all the way back to the Gold Rush.
After a delay posting work from the summer due to various health issues, at least it doesn’t feel awkward to be posting them now, thanks to our seemingly endless summer.
In the sketch above, this bright red Chinese newspaper box on the Clark Kerr Campus immediately drew my attention. Clark Kerr was built in the 1930s as a residential school for the blind. When blind students began mainstreaming into regular public schools, the University of California Berkeley bought the complex for student housing. Clark Kerr’s beautiful, serene grounds and Spanish style buildings provide an oasis of sketching opportunities in the middle of a busy urban area.
Lima, Peru, ink and watercolor from Google Streetview, 4×5 in
I love doing the Virtual Paintout, strolling around a city in Google Streetview and picking a scene to paint. This sketch is a preliminary study for an oil painting still in progress. The location is Nicolas de Pierola and Jr. Cańete Streets in Lima, Peru. Here’s a link to the map: http://goo.gl/maps/hQdsp.
Below is the original screenshot plus a few other streetview pictures from around Lima. Although the city looked very beautiful, I’m often drawn to funkier parts of town.
Original Scene
Front Porch Sitters
Funny little motorcycle/car hybrids
More motorcycle cars
Bimbo bread. Hope it doesn’t have the same meaning in Spanish!
Central Park Conservatory Water, NY, ink and watercolor, 5×5″x7.5″
Saturday mid-day we met Brooklyn art blogger (and funny lady) Carol King by the Conservatory Water (above) in Central Park, named for the Conservatory of Flowers building it was meant to reflect but that was never constructed.
In the sketch above, I abused the rules of perspective, enlarging the boathouse and model boats but not the distance to the front of the pond, making the water look more like a kids pool than the small lake you can see in the photo below. Oops.
Photo of Central Park’s Conservatory water from where we were sketching in the park
Before Central Park, we went to the Metropolitan Museum where they were presenting hourly performances of John Zorn music to celebrate the avant-garde composer’s 60th birthday. I’d heard him interviewed on Fresh Air and was blown away by his dedication to a life of creativity, stripping almost everything else out of his life. You can read the full transcript here. This (slightly edited by me) quote really got me:
GROSS: What does turning 60 mean to you?
ZORN: There are no more doubts...That little guy that sits on my shoulder…that used to whisper in [my] ear, you know, “you could be really wrong about this,” that guy’s not around anymore. I brushed him off.
Everything is very clear: what I need to do, why I’m on the planet, the best way to accomplish it, what is a distraction, what helps me focus. Everything is really there. And…I work very hard, I work all the time, I’m not really interested in vacations or getting away from my work….
Now there are no more solutions because there are no more problems. I just turn the tap, and the music comes pouring out.
We chose the 11:00 a.m. performance Volac – Masada; Book of Angels with Erik Friedlander, cello, held in the Assyrian Gallery.
Assyrian Lamassi at Met during John Zorn Concert, ink, 7.5 x 5′Assyrian Lamassi protective being, after the concert and the crowd left
The sketch above left started out quite nicely, despite drawing standing in a crowd. But later, forgetting I’d used a water-soluble pen, I added watercolor. The ink spread and smeared all over. I tried restating the lines with a brush pen but don’t like the results.
I filmed the clip below holding my iPhone over my head; I couldn’t see what I was recording since my actual view was the crowd in front me as in the sketch above, but at least it is a snippet of the sights and sounds:
Next Carol was taking us to Brooklyn. We followed her down 5th Avenue to the subway, stopping quickly along the way for her to pick up a new-to-me food item. Pronounced as one word, “butterroll,” according to internet sources a “buttered roll is a big, pre-buttered, pre-wrapped roll, soft in the inside, chewy on the outside. Usually eaten in the morning with a cup of coffee, regular.”
And that’s another New York food oddity: when you order coffee most places you’re supposed to say “regular” if you want it with a “normal” amount of milk and sugar, or specify dark, light, sweet, or no sugar if you want something different because they put the stuff in there for you. I’m glad we had a coffee grinder filled with dark, rich beans and a French Press pot in our apartment. It was the best coffee I had in New York, with just the right amount of modifiers, added visually not verbally.
View from Battery Park, Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island, ink and watercolor, 5.5×7.5″
My first morning in Manhattan I woke to sun streaming through the trees and hurried to get ready for a day of sketching in Battery Park with Shirley Levine and Pat Gaignat. Above is my first sketch of the day: the view from Battery Park of the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island, where my grandfathers first arrived in the U.S. from Russia. It seemed like a perfect way to mark my arrival too.
Pat had created a multi-media iBook titled “Way to Go, Jana!” with directions for finding my way to the park at the other end of Manhattan. I downloaded it to my iPhone and headed out the door.
At my first intersection I stepped off the curb at a green light and BAM! a truck hit a motorcycle right in front of me. The bike went down but the rider didn’t seem injured. The drivers began their negotiations and I scurried across the street.
Below are a couple of screenshots from Pat’s e-book that I literally would have been lost without!
Pat’s guide map pagePat’s guide starring Shirley
In the afternoon we joined a dozen artists on benches around a small plaza for the start of “Figures al Fresco,” a weekly, free, clothed figure-drawing session sponsored by the city, complete with teacher. She drove up in an electric cart filled with art supplies to use during the session, including drawing boards, paper pads, watercolors, charcoal and pencils. I did most of my figure drawings on a newsprint pad from the cart. The last one (below) I did in my journal with my new Pentel Tradio Stylowater-soluble pen and a water brush.
Battery Park Figure Sketching, ink, 7.5×5.5″
John, the model was excellent, with many interesting poses that simulated working in fields and other kinds of manual labor. The teacher requested he remove his shoes so we could draw his feet. He took off the shoes, but wouldn’t remove his socks.
Pat’s photo of me sketching in Battery Park
When the session ended at 4:30, in a hurry I returned my drawing pad to the cart, forgetting to remove my sketches. Then I joined Pat to walk the High Line, a public park built on a former elevated railroad line, as part of our journey back uptown.
You can see Shirley’s drawings here and Pat’s here. Shirley’s figure drawings show such sensitivity for the human form and Pat’s work is strong and unique. She draws on an iPad using a digital tool meant for drawing and filling shapes, not making lines. It seems extra challenging to me, but gives her line work a really dynamic look.
One funny thing about Pat who I only knew through our blogs…I didn’t realize until I saw her gentle face that I had pictured her looking the way she draws people, with thick, edgy, sharp, black outlines!
Jana Bouc, Artist 