Category: People

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Drawing People Photos Places Sketchbook Pages Subway drawings

Sketching the Week Away

Palace Hotel Garden Court detail, Copic Multiliner
Palace Hotel Garden Court detail, Copic Multiliner

After an all day meeting in San Francisco on Wednesday I met art buddy Sonia for some sketching at the Palace Hotel’s Garden Court atrium. It’s a stunning and historical room but detail lover that I am, I chose one tiny spot across the room to draw and then spent an hour on it, while Sonia did 4 or 5 sketches.

Palace Hotel Garden Court
Palace Hotel Garden Court

I started with the furthest chandelier and the clock on the wall and just kept discovering more and more fun things to draw. If we weren’t so hungry and tired we could have stayed there all night sketching.

Chatting Over Coffee, ink
Two Ladies Chatting Over Coffee

The first lady just slid right off my pen, perfectly drawn (as I saw her) but her friend kept moving and I couldn’t get close to a  likeness.

Random subway sketches
Random BART Subway Sketches

More commuter sketches (and one eagle who adorns the top of the Oakland City Hall). My co-workers and I took advantage of a sunny and surprisingly quiet day at the office to walk to Oakland City Center for lunch (ergo the Bean and Cheese sticker) and I even had a moment to pull out my sketchbook.

That messy little boy top right was on a field trip but looked like he should have still been home in bed. And that’s where I should be too. It’s been a rocky week. Glad it’s over.

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Animals Bay Area Parks Drawing Ink and watercolor wash Outdoors/Landscape Painting People Places Sketchbook Pages

Goose (Poop) Park and Subway Sketches

Snow Park (Goose Park), ink & watercolor
Snow Park (Goose Park), ink & watercolor

I meant to take a walk at lunch today but when I saw this old lady feeding the geese I had to stop and sketch. This is a little park near my office in downtown Oakland called “Snow Park” but a better name would be “Goose Poop Park” since it’s home to the many Canadian geese who don’t seem to feel the need to head north or south any longer.

Bart faces and feet, ink & watercolor
Bart faces and feet, ink & watercolor

I drew the faces of these subway riders on my way to work this morning. I drew the feet on the way home. That guy was holding his juice on the floor with his feet.

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Drawing Ink and watercolor wash Painting People Sketchbook Pages

I’m Not a Party Girl but She Is

The Party Girl #1, ink & watercolor in sketchbook
The Party Girl #1, ink & watercolor in sketchbook

I am so not a party girl. But my son’s fiancée is and loves any opportunity to play dress up. I was invited to her birthday party, designated (tongue in cheek) as a swanky cocktail party. I said I’d come but since I don’t own anything swanky and I firmly believe in Thoreau’s wise words, “Beware of all enterprises that require new clothes” I wouldn’t be too swanky. As it turned out, I wasn’t alone, and it was fun to see the variety of outfits people were decked out in. (My wine-colored blouse and long black skirt turned out to be perfect, as strangely enough nearly everyone was wearing combinations of black and wine or plum).

The Party Girl, ink & watercolor in sketchbook
The Party Girl, ink & watercolor in sketchbook

The birthday girl was the epitomy of swank, with a skin-tight, teensy, black satin dress, long-sleeved black satin gloves, stilettos and lots of chunky bling. She is a beautiful girl, a lithe formal model and dancer, and so pulled it off elegantly and magestically, truly the princess of her party. (Sorry E, that my sketch added 20 pounds at least to your perfect figure).

Several people chose interesting hats to accompany their outfits: from a funky straw rodeo-style cowboy hat accompanying a chiffon party dress, high heels and sun glasses to a young man wearing a strange winter cap with ear flaps and Buddy Holly style glasses. (This was a Berkeley party, after all!)

Most of the people at the party were friends and family of the birthday girl so nobody seemed to mind my sitting on the couch sketching. When the cowboy-hatted drama teacher asked to see my sketchbook and I said I was embarrased at how badly I’d drawn her she gave me a big lecture on not putting down my work and never saying, “Just” as in I was “just sketching”! I could see why her students love her and are inspired by her.

It was a lovely party and yet, in my usual reclusive style, I was happy to depart after two hours and return home to a painting I was working on.

Categories
Animals Bay Area Parks Drawing Ink and watercolor wash Life in general Outdoors/Landscape People Places Sketchbook Pages Sketchercize

Pt. Isabel Sketchercize

Pt. Isabel Sights, ink & watercolor
Pt. Isabel Sights, ink & watercolor

No those aren’t circus dogs stacked up in a doggie pyramid, I just drew them that way as dogs came and went, begging for scraps at the table where the couple was eating lunch.

I’d planned to spend the day in the studio today, but when Barbara called to invite me for a walk at Pt. Isabel, I couldn’t resist. Since it was sunny and not too windy (or so I thought) I also brought along my plein air gear, thinking I might set up to paint there after our walk.  But we took a L-O-N-G walk on the Bay Trail with an equally long walk back, and then had a late lunch at the Sit Stay Cafe in the dog park.

The wind had picked up and I was getting cold and didn’t really feel like spending 3 hours standing in the wind (see top left picture with poor bent over tree from the constant ocean winds). So while I was trying to decide, Barbara took out her sketchbook and I decided to do the same. By the time I finished it was already 4:00 and another weekend was nearly over.

But a day with good solid exercise and a little sketching is a good day and it counts. (Unlike some days that just suck and don’t count.)

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Berkeley Drawing Flower Art Ink and watercolor wash People Places Sketchbook Pages

Sketching Around

Rose Walk Steps, Berkeley, Ink & Watercolor
Rose Walk Path steps, Berkeley, Ink & Watercolor

For our Monday night sketchcrawl we met at the Berkeley Rose Garden, sketched a bit, and then took a stroll along Euclid Ave. At sunset we sketched at the foot of the Rose Walk Path steps where two women residents of the cluster of Maybeck cottages there had a cheerful chat in front of a large Japanese maple while we sketched them.

20090720-Hollyhock
Hollyhocks, ink & watercolor
Berkeley Rose Garden views, Ink & watercolor
Berkeley Rose Garden views, Ink & watercolor

Inside the rose garden I sketched the trees and the person reading in a bright spot of sun. The hollyhocks on the right were our last sketching stop since it was totally dark by the time we finished them.

The Squid Boat, ink & watercolor, 9x6"
The Squid Boat, ink & watercolor, 9x6"

On Sunday I spent the afternoon on a beautiful sailboat on the San Francisco Bay. After our sail my friend Barbara and I found a dockside bench near a cafe to sketch before heading home. This funny little fishing boat was docked there and was a perfect subject for a quick sketch.

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Albany Drawing Faces Ink and watercolor wash People Places Sketchbook Pages

Monday Night Sketchcrawl: Albany

Sketching San Pablo Ave to Peets
Sketching San Pablo Ave to Peets

Monday night Cathy and I did a little sketching around San Pablo Avenue between Albany and El Cerrito, not the most inspiring of locales it turns out. It amused me that the palm tree above had an Available for Lease sign just in front of it, though it was actually a space in the building behind it (that I didn’t draw) that was for lease. The other pics above are of the Albany bowl and inside Peets Coffee where we ended the evening.

Old West Gun Room
Old West Gun Room

We started at the Old Gun Room, a still-functioning, historic gun store that is terribly out of place and time. I was having trouble paying close attention to detail last night, and drew  the N in “Guns” on the sign backwards, as well as adding an extra wagon wheel in the fence. I think I did a better job last time I drew and painted the Gun Room when I painted it on site.

Hotsy Totsy Club, Albany
Hotsy Totsy Club, Albany

I like the way the Hotsy-Totsy sign came out, though I’m not sure what happened to the perspective: I KNOW I couldn’t have seen the top of the sign. But I was really hungry at that point and was having even more trouble paying attention to details. By the way, the Hotsy-Totsy Club is anything but! It opens around 7 a.m. (need I say more?).(UPDATE: the club has new owners and a new clientele and a fun retro vibe; see my newer post here).

Cathy likes to sketch on site in order to capture more images, and then adds paint at home.  I don’t usually do that, preferring to paint on site,  but tried it last night. After I’d done all the cross-hatching on the windows and door area, trying to shade them, I looked at what Cathy was doing and saw that she just does the outlines without any cross-hatching when she’s going to paint the images later. I think that makes more sense and allows the watercolor to do the shading rather than the incongruous scribbly ink that was too dark.

We decided that next week we’ll go somewhere pretty and away from traffic, like the Berkeley Rose Garden.

Categories
Ink and watercolor wash Life in general People Sketchbook Pages

Healing Garden at Christ the Light Cathedral: Between a Rock and a Hard Place

Healing Garden, 6x9", ink & watercolor
Healing Garden, 6x9", ink & watercolor (Kremer Pigments)

Hidden away behind the new, massive Oakland Cathedral of Christ the Light is a “Healing Garden” for the victims of sexual abuse by priests. I knew it was there because I’d read about it when the cathedral was opened to the public, but had a hard time finding it.

I was having a stressful day at my office, which is just across the street from the cathedral,  and had gone looking for the garden at lunch. I thought that a few minutes in a healing garden would be restorative before tackling the afternoon’s work.

The “garden” is hidden away in a little corner behind the church, and consists of a small patio, about 10 feet in diameter, ringed by wooden benches arranged in a circle around what looks like a big cracked  rock. The only greenery in the “garden” are some small hedges in cement planters that support the slatted benches.

The healing I found in the garden came from sunshine and sketching, not from sitting next to the huge concrete cathedral, on a hard wooden bench, gazing at what turned out to be a sculpture of a big cracked rock, not an actual rock.

The plaque on the bench:  “This healing garden, planned by survivors, is dedicated to those innocents sexually abused by members of the clergy. We remember, and we affirm, NEVER AGAIN.”

The plaque beside the sculpture:  “Some day, 11, 2000.  Masatoshi Izumi. Basalt.”

I get that the sculpture might represent how hard, broken, and cracked apart the lives of the victims must be. What I don’t get is how this could be called a “Healing Garden.” Where’s the garden? Where’s the healing?

I hope that survivors who visit and are able to find the garden do find it a healing experience.

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Ink and watercolor wash Life in general People Sketchbook Pages

Sketching at Peets Coffee Pinole

View from Peets Coffee Pinole, ink & watercolor
View from Peets Coffee Pinole, ink & watercolor

It was 86 degrees but quite comfortable in the shade of an umbrella, on the patio at Peets Coffee in Pinole, where I sipped my iced latte and sketched this view of the parking lot and hills behind it. I’d dropped off a key at my son’s house nearby and then done my grocery shopping at Trader Joe’s and decided I deserved a delicious  icy reward next door at Peets.

Mr. Fidget keeps moving
Mr. Fidget keeps moving

This guy never stopped moving, feet up on a chair, knees up, leaning sideways, feet under chair, flip-flops on, off. I was so happy when he put his feet back on the ground so I could finish the sketch. It felt good to slow down on a busy day and sit and draw, but when I checked my watch I realized my groceries had been baking in the car for nearly an hour. I packed up and added watercolor at home.

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Drawing Faces Life in general People Sketchbook Pages

Girls Just Wanna Be…. (Dredging the Past for New Series)

Finding Tina (top from memory, bottom from yearbook)
Finding Tina (top from memory, bottom from yearbook)

I was sketching and looking at my high school yearbook in preparation for a series of paintings I’m starting. I was surprised by the low expectations so many of the girls in the yearbook had for themselves compared to today’s young women. I started counting how many “hoped to eventually” to become beauticians, secretaries and airline hostesses (flight attendants). Even my high school best friend Tina’s yearbook entry said she aimed to be a beautician (not to denigrate those important jobs, but there are so many more options for women now.) Maybe it was the elaborate, sculptural hairstyles back then that made so many of us want to be hairstylists?

When I read the tender, poetic inscription Tina wrote in my annual,  I decided to try to find her again.  We’d lost touch with when I moved away a year after high school and have unsuccessfully searched for her for years. Today I found her 86-year-0ld father, just by typing his last name and the city where we lived into the people finder on YellowPages.com! He promised to give her my phone number and then filled me in on her life over the many decades since we last were together.

Jana's senior picture and yearbook entry
Jana's senior picture and yearbook entry

When I filled out the form for my blurb I was trying to be funny:  “Hopes to marry a millionaire…especially liked the people, weekends, and vacations.” But there was some truth in it too. I was so done with high school and wasn’t looking forward to having to grow up and get a job, either.

OK, so maybe I was procrastinating and avoiding the nice blank canvas waiting for me… but, (not counting the girls who said they just wanted to be happy, or didn’t mention their goals at all), here is my tally of career goals for San Diego’s Crawford High class of  ’66 (I put the odd outliers in red):

  • Teacher: 67  (90% said elementary teacher)
  • Graduate from college: 55 (and then get married: 30)
  • Secretary: 51
  • Airline hostess: 33
  • Beautician: 23
  • Nurse 21
  • Housewife: 20
  • Dental/medical assistant: 19
  • Commercial artist: 14
  • Social worker: 11
  • Psychologist or Psychoanalyst: 11
  • Travel the world: 11
  • Interior Decorator: 9
  • Dress designer: 8
  • Model: 6
  • Doctor: 6 (mostly pediatricians)
  • Scientist, mathematician, engineer: 3
  • Diplomat, linguist: 2
  • Bullfighter: 2
  • FBI/Secret Agent: 2
  • Probation officer: 2
  • Owner of Village of Pancake House: 1
  • Mortician: 1
  • Police woman: 1
  • Artist: 1 (and she is did it: Deborah Butterfield is famous for her sculptures of horses)
Categories
Drawing People Sketchbook Pages

Sketching the NBA Basketball Finals

NBA players and yelling manager, ink
NBA players and yelling manager, ink

Except for doing these sketches while watching the NBA Basketball Finals last week, it was a pretty rough week, with no energy for art or blogging. I kept putting the TiVo on pause to sketch, enjoying drawing with a Pilot fountain pen and then adding a bit of water to make the line bleed and turn into an ink wash.

NBA Finals: Aiming for a free throw, ink
NBA Finals: Aiming for a free throw, ink

Then I started trying to capture a little more action, drawing in pencil.

NBA Finals pencil sketch
NBA Finals pencil sketch

I enjoy watching basketball playoffs and seeing these 7 foot tall, extremely buff, and mostly really cute guys with charming smiles, maneuver their massive bodies like ballerinas, leaping through the air, dodging and dancing around each other, or just storming down the court like a locomotive, charging the hoop, hanging from it when they dunk the ball in, or tossing the ball from across the court and watching it swish right in (or not).

I took so long with pausing the game to sketch that I had to fast forward to the last five minutes to see who won so that I could go to bed before midnight.