"Who Am I" according to Snoop Dog #1, Ink & Gouache
Continuing with International Fake Journal Month, and my (fake) search for my identity by listening to lyrics of songs titled “Who Am I.” Today my clues come from Snoop Doggy Dog’s (unlistenable, disgusting) song “Who Am I: What’s My Name.” According to his lyrics:
Now just throw your hands in the xxx air
And wave the xxxs like ya just don’t care.
I step through the fog and I creep through the smog
cuz I’m Snoop Doggy (what?) Doggy (what?) Doggy [Dog].
The Biggest Nuts, Ink & Gouache
Then he says:
“…with the biggest nuts and guess what?
He is I, and I am him, slim with the tilted brim.”
I listened to samples of Snoop’s catalog on Amazon while I was sketching and decided that he has an awful potty mouth, doesn’t make sense and therefore must discard his clues. Clearly, despite his claims, I am neither the one with the biggest nuts nor a dog. But I loved throwing my hands in the air and waving ’em like I just don’t care.
Today was International Sketchcrawl 22. Martha had a morning event to attend so instead of joining the San Francisco group we met at 2:00 and sketched around the Colusa Circle in Kensington/El Cerrito. The sketch above is of my favorite grocery store, Colusa Market. Their produce is always fresh and delicious.
After a visit to pet the bunnies at Rabbit Ears, a pet store specializing in rabbits, and taking a peek into the Kensington Circus Pub (which was closed but would have been fun to sketch in) we took a hike through the nearby Sunset View Cemetery. I’ve painted there before and love the hilltop bay views and peaceful surroundings.
Sunset Cemetery, ink & watercolor
The fog rolled in and what had been a hot day turned chilly. Martha was cold and my butt fell asleep from sitting on a cement block so we headed back down to our cars. It was after 5:00 and time to say good bye. Not an all-day sketchcrawl this time but a good afternoon with excellent company on a beautiful day.
Who Am I, Sepia Micron Pigma Ink & Gouache, 5.5x7.5"
This is the beginning of my contribution to International Fake Journal Month (read on for more about this). To participate, I’m filling a journal this month as a woman who doesn’t know who she is and is trying to find out. (Maybe she’ll learn how she lost her memory too.) I started by Googling “Who Am I” and clicked the first link, a YouTube video by Casting Crowns which inspired the rose and waves besides my pondering self.
Then I checked iTunes and found more than 100 songs named “Who Am I.” I shall play detective, listening to each song, reading the lyrics looking for clues to who “I” am. I’m looking forward to Snoop Dogg’s “Who Am I” day. As I write and draw what I learn, I’ll fill the journal and by the end of the month may have discovered my true identity.
International Fake Journal Month
Roz Stendahl of Roz Wound Up and The International Fake Journal Month blogs is one of my favorite artist bloggers. This month she introduced a quirky and wonderful concept: The Fake Journal. The idea is to create a journal for a month, where you take on a new persona, and fill that journal with the writings and sketches of that person as he or she evolves. To learn more about Fake Journal Month and Roz..
The weather has been so glorious the past few days it’s hard to be indoors, especially when cold April showers are predicted for the rest of the week. I decided to combine a walk with doing errands and calling my mom, so I tossed my sketching kit in my bag, grabbed my iPhone and headed out the door.
Three blocks from home I spotted these fuchsias. I remembered how my sister and I used to pretend these flowers were little ballerinas and dance them around our San Diego backyard. But I couldn’t remember what they were called. Since I had my mom on the phone, I asked her, “What are those little pink flowers called that look like ballet dancers?”
My mother is 86 years old and we’d just been having a fruitless conversation about Digital TV vs HD TV and LCD vs LED (and this with someone whose VCR has been blinking 12:00 for years). She said she had no idea what flower I was talking about but began describing random flowers that might qualify.
Meanwhile, I’d finished my ink drawing, set up my watercolors on the ground, and started painting. As I was writing a note in my sketchbook I remembered they were called fuchsias, like the color.
I changed the subject, packed up, and started walking again. We continued our conversation until I reached the market and it was time for her to watch General Hospital.
Botanical Sketching in the 1500s
Fuchsias were named for Leonhart Fuchs, born in 1501, a doctor who studied plants for their medicinal uses and wrote De Historia Stirpium comentarii insignes(or Notable Commentaries on the History of Plants) (because all medicine was herbal back then). The original book, in excellent condition, is in the University of Missouri library and available for viewing. There are digital images of the book and its illustrations on their website or clicking the image below.
Stolen Roses, Ink & watercolor, in 5x7" wc Moleskine
As Maya Angelou said her grandmother always told her, “You don’t always get what you pay for, but you always pay for what you get.” As a believer in Karma and Maya Angelou’s grandma, I was a little nervous about stealing my neighbor’s roses.
But that neighbor moved away a year ago and her roses were producing those first magnificent blooms of the year. I just couldn’t resist cutting a few to sketch. I drew them with my Micron Pigma .01 and then added watercolor. I wasn’t happy with the results so experimented with adding white lines with a new white gel pen, a “Y&C Gel Extreme .07” which I like it a lot. I liked the sketch (above) better too.
I decided to sketch them again and used my Micron Pigma with a lot of cross-hatching to try to understand their form in a more sculptural way.
Stolen Roses 2; ink, gouache, watercolor
Then I added watercolor and made a big mess. I couldn’t capture the delicate coloring from white to yellow with red edges of one of the roses . So I tried adding gouache. Yuck, worse mess. I washed off the paint and tried again. More mess, and this time I lost a lot of the black lines. So I got out a Sharpie fine point and went over the black lines with darker ones. More gouache, yuck, some white pen, gave up.
Then I took a bunch of photos of the roses, thinking I’d start an oil painting and keep a photo reference in case the painting took longer than they lived. Pretty soon I was coughing and sneezing and my eyes were watering. These roses were very fragrant and I was allergic to them (unlike the ones in my garden that I selected for their lack of scent). I put them outside and gave up. I guess I paid for what I got!
I thought I was bringing my car in for an oil change, but the service manager told me it was way overdue for its 3 year/30,000 mile major maintenance (about 3 years overdue, as a matter of fact). I take public transit or walk whenever I can so my 2002 Toyota RAV 4 has less than 26,000 miles on it. I thought I could wait until 30,000 but he said no because the kind of short trips I take are harder on the car than lots of regular driving .
So I left it with him to do the full boogie on the car, feeling a bit sheepish at my car abuse. Despite the offer of a ride, I decided to walk the two miles home, hoping I’d find something fun to draw on the way. Sure enough a mile into the walk, I found this beautiful creek I never knew existed, half in the shade and half brilliantly lit with spring greenery all around.
As I was sketching and painting, an elderly Asian woman (99 Ranch Market is an Asian shopping center) showed me the bag of bread she was bringing for the resident ducks and then wandered off down the path, hoping to find them.
When I got home I realized I’d left all of my keys with the service manager. Oops…. But fortunately I have a “Plan B” for my keys, having locked myself out one too many times in the past.
And now my car seems so much perkier and happier with all new fresh fluids and the nice car wash they gave it. I’m very fond of my car, it’s always been totally reliable, and I really should treat it better.
Proteus in Bloom, ink & gouache, Moleskine 5x7 sketchbook
When I was walking to BART last week I ran into Fletch who had just finished shooting photos of an amazing Proteus a few blocks from my house. I must have walked by this stunning plant a hundred times and never noticed it until he pointed it out to me. I couldn’t stop to sketch that morning but finally got back there this afternoon.
I got as close as I could without trespassing and sketched with my Micron Pigma .01 pen, trying to capture the many different forms the blossoms take along the way to fully blooming. Then I used my mini gouache palette and a tiny brush to paint the details. Gouache seemed like a perfect medium for doing this kind of detailed botanical sketching.
I also took a bunch of photos of these amazing and diverse flowers. Here are a couple of them:
Photo of Proteus blossomProteus in bloom, photo
Note to self: Find proteus at a nursery and plant them! But first I want to do some larger botanical illustrations from my photos (or from life if I can convince the woman who owns the plant to allow me to take some cuttings). Fletch told me she reluctantly allowed him to take one.
And here’s a bit of etymological (word origin) trivia about theProteus:
The Proteus got its name because of its amazing diversity of form: It was named after the Greek sea god, Proteus, who was able to change his appearance at will. From this comes the adjective “protean,” which means “versatile”, “mutable”, “capable of assuming many forms.” “Protean” has positive connotations of flexibility, versatility and adaptability.
After our painting session at Old Borges Ranch on Saturday I did a few ink and watercolor sketches of the critters who were roaming around where we sat for lunch and our critique. This rooster was wonderful and actually seemed to pose for me, just long enough to get this much and then he wandered off.
The chickens weren’t as cooperative. I wish I took a photo of the goofy gal at the bottom. She had the funniest, fluffy clown feathers–sort of like 3 sets of beards; one in the usual place and the other two on either side of her face.
Bit's o' chickens, ink & watercolor in Moleskine
This goat seemed like such a happy guy (or gal?) chillin’ out in this empty tub. I was very hungry since I’d remembered all my art supplies but forgotten to bring lunch and it was already 3:00. I rushed drawing the tub and I can see that it’s not deep enough and looks a bit like a sardine can.
Goat chilling out in a tub; ink & watercolor in Moleskine 5x7" sketchbook
I’m using a really funky old computer monitor while mine is off for repairs so I have no idea how any of this is going to look on my blog. Hopefully the scans and colors are decent and the sizes of images make sense.
View from Old Borges Ranch; Plein air, Oil on panel, 9x12"
I’m celebrating a bit of progress I saw today when I painted plein air at Old Borges Ranch in Walnut Creek. I painted at this site a year ago and had a terrible time, titling the post of the awful painting I did that day, “Am I Having Fun Yet? Uh…no!”
Today was a lot more fun. I started the painting with a plan (described below) and stuck with it until I started rushing to wrap it up in time for our group critique at 1:00 when I muddied things up a bit since the light had changed in the scene from when I first started at 10:30.
When I put the painting in the line up with the other 14 paintings, I didn’t even cringe or feel embarrassed. It helped too, that I now understand that my plein air paintings are sketches, not finished works of art.
Here are the steps I took that seemed to work for me:
I’m really enjoying sketching anywhere and everywhere lately. Here are a few sketches with watercolor added later from BART stations and trains this week.
In His Own World, ink & gouache in sketchbook
These pigeons were doing the Romeo and Juliet thing in the BART station. BART put up mean wire pigeon preventers everywhere that makes it hard for them to perch anywhere. But these two found a dark corner to bill and coo. I know next to nothing about birds, but Romeo was puffing up his (?) neck as he made his croohoo noise and canoodled with Juliet who kept sticking her feathered hiney up in the air.
BART Station Pigeons, ink & gouache in sketchbook
I added the gouache on the last two at home, not on BART, since I usually only have a few minutes for each sketch.
Jana Bouc, Artist 