Category: Sketchbook Pages

A Morning Walk

A neighbor’s beautiful front garden and purple house

Ink and watercolor in small Moleskine watercolor notebook
Click images, select All Sizes to enlarge

The creek by Peets Coffee and Albany Hill

Today I woke to a beautiful spring day and went for a walk with my sketchbook and little paint set, planning to end up at the creek for another try at painting it. I find it quite challenging (impossible, really) to make something that looks like a creek amidst trees and spring greenery. But a few blocks from my house I spotted a beautifully landscaped yard in front of a tiny blue and purple house and had to stop and paint the blossoming fruit (?) tree surrounded by what I always think of as Martian plants (a little painting of one kind here). But they’re really called Euphorbia (photo of this kind), which is almost “euphoria” and always makes me wonder how it got named that.

So being a word-loving dictionary nerd I had to look it up. It wasn’t very exciting: “From Latin, euphorbea after Euphorbus, first-century Greek physician.” Also, “Euphorbiaceae: very large genus of diverse plants all having milky juice.” I think I’ll just keep calling it Martian plant since it’s so otherworldly looking.

But euphoria — what an interesting definition: ” A feeling of great happiness or well-being, commonly exaggerated and not necessarily well founded.” Hmmmmm, that makes me stop and ponder. If I’m feeling unfounded happiness or well-being, I’m not about to question it! Bring it on!

Tags Pen and Ink

Drawing Life in general Sketchbook Pages

Goodbye Old Hoodie

Memory Brush Pen in Aquabee 6×9 sketchbook
To enlarge click images, select All Sizes

Ink in my AM/PM sketchbook

These are ritual goodbye drawings of my ratty, old, gray hooded sweatshirt. I’ve been wearing it as a sort of housecoat/bathrobe for years. I put it on over my pajamas in the morning and wear it year-round to stay comfy in my house day and night, where it’s usually a degree or two cooler than I’d like.

My cat Busby chewed up the zipper months ago, so zipping it requires lining up the teeth in three different places where they’re missing. A few weeks ago the tab on the zipper fell off, making it even harder to close. It’s full of holes and threadbare spots, paint stains, bleach stains, and a grease stain from when I slipped carrying the barbeque and the grease never washed out.

Last week while my car had an oil change I visited the Target next door and bought two new grey “hoodies” on sale. They’re soft and clean and warm with perfect zippers and no stains. But I’ve been ignoring them, choosing to wear my old one. To help me part with what’s become a bit of a security blanket, I did these drawings to honor the ratty old thing before I toss it in the trash.

By the way, when did sweatshirts become known as hoodies? I somehow missed that moment in time. For years they were sweatshirts and then all of a sudden they were hoodies. It seems like such a cutesy name for such a homely item of apparel.

Tags Pen and Ink

Drawing People Sketchbook Pages Subway drawings

Subway Drawings (BART)

Some drawings from my morning and evening BART rides today in ink in my small Moleskine sketchbook.

To enlarge click images and select All Sizes.

A.M. Waiting for the train

AM Riding to Work

PM Riding Home

Tags Pen and Ink, People, Subway drawings

Sketchbook Pages Watercolor

Feeling Swirly

Watercolor in Aquabee 6×9 sketchbook
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This is a sketch of how I’m feeling tonight. I was feeling too swirly (a made up word) to draw something particular so I decided to just play with colors for a little while, trying to draw what my mind feels like, and then call it a day.

People Sketchbook Pages Watercolor

Another portrait sketch request

Post author By Jana Bouc
Post date March 25, 2007
11 Comments on Another portrait sketch request

Brown ink and watercolor in Moleskine large watercolor notebook
To enlarge, click images, select All Sizes

A few days after I posted the drawing of Dane I received an email from Aileen, the beautiful woman in the photo below, who sent me her photo and asked me to draw her too.

I planned to do a quick sketch of her today as a warm up before doing some “real” painting (I put that in quotes because it’s silly of me to think that one kind of drawing or painting is more “real” than another). But instead of it being a warm up I spent all of my painting time today working on sketches of her.

I drew the first one at the top quickly in ink and then painted it. The drawing was goofy so I decided to do it again, using pencil and eraser, still working in my large Moleskine watercolor notebook and came up with the this one:

I wasn’t happy with the way the ultramarine blue I used in the shadows looked and the drawing still wasn’t quite right so I did it again, this time using the last page in my Moleskine notebook:

In this one I did a fairly dark pencil drawing first, planning to leave it mostly as a pencil drawing, just adding just a little paint, but I got carried away and forgot my plan.

The funny thing is now that I’m done, I like the very first one I did the best. It may not look like her, but it was the most fun to do and is the most Jana of all of them.

Which do you prefer and why?

Tags Pen and Ink, People

Sketchbook Pages

Berkeley Rose Garden

Ink & watercolor in large Moleskine watercolor notebook
To enlarge, click image, select All Sizes

After I drew the stinky flowers I walked up the hill to the Berkeley Rose Garden. None of the rose are blooming but the surrounding trees and bushes were lovely shades of gold and red and green. I sat on a wall above the amphitheater drawing with my back to a little patio facing the street. When I arrived there was just another man and I enjoying the view and the sun. Then teenagers started arriving just like a flock of crows, one than another than a gaggle of girls…until there were 30 or more teens yelling and laughing and boasting and mostly, posing. Trying to show off for each other about how they were going to party and drink beer. I finally turned around and could see they were all nice middle class kids, probably middle-schoolers trying to be oh so grown up.

Here’s a photo from the Rose Garden’s website of the scene I painted from a slightly different angle.

Art theory Drawing Faces Other Art Blogs I Read People Photos Portrait Sketchbook Pages Watercolor

Painting vs Preparing to Paint (& Portrait Request)

Post author By Jana Bouc
Post date March 18, 2007
13 Comments on Painting vs Preparing to Paint (& Portrait Request)

Brown Micron Pigma ink and watercolor in large Moleskine Watercolor notebook
To enlarge, click images, select All Sizes

The other day I got a mysterious email from someone calling himself “Fake Dane.” He wrote, “Hey, I think your art is great. I was wondering if you’d be willing to sketch me from a picture. I’m assembling a collection that I’d post. Dane”

And he sent me his photo. If you want to draw him too, just click the photo below and select All Sizes when you get to Flickr and then you can print it out:

I wrote back, “Sure, why not?” and did the sketch above. I was going for caricature so I hope he’s not offended. (UPDATE: He replied and said he really liked it and put it on his blog. There’s some funny drawings of him as a vampire there too.) If you want to do a drawing of him and send it to him too, there’s instructions in the “Please Read” sidebar on his blog.

It was a fun, quick painting project on a day in the studio that was mostly spent at the computer, trying to sort out photos and compositions for upcoming paintings, something I don’t particularly enjoy doing. And that made me think about the differences between…

Alla Prima/Plein Air vs carefully planned painting

When I’m planning a painting I consider focus, value, composition, color scheme, etc. I do thumbnails and value sketches. If it’s something requiring exact proportions, such as a portrait of someone’s child, pet or home, I’ll start with a drawing and then work from a photo, tracing it onto the watercolor paper. But even with more carefree subjects like flowers and still life or landscapes, that prep work saves a lot of frustration once painting is underway. I’ve learned that lesson the hard way.

On the other hand, my understanding is that people who regularly paint alla prima (in one setting) or plein air make the prep work quick and intuitive and let go of exactitude, painting their impression of the subject rather than a careful rendering. I’ve done some and it’s a lot harder than people like Kris Shanks, Nel Jansen, Ed Terpening, and others whose blogs I enjoy visiting, make it look.

What I’m trying to figure out is how to combine the two approaches, or how to avoid all the labored pre-planning. Judy Morris, the teacher of the workshop I took in February, said that her favorite part is planning and composing from photos, not the actual painting. For me it’s the opposite — while I enjoy drawing, I love painting more and don’t really enjoy spending a lot of time photoshopping compositions and sorting through photos at the computer. (She does the prep work manually, working with black and white photocopies and enlargements of the subject and background, which she cuts out and assembles.
On the other hand, if I don’t do the pre-planning (especially with watercolor) the whole painting ends up being a study that has to be done over. I guess with acrylics and to some extent oils, one can just keep working on and changing a piece until it’s right, but I’m not sure if that’s a great way to go either.

I’m hoping to find my own way of working that incorporates the best of both worlds.

Tags Faces, Pen and Ink, People, Photos

Flower Art Plants Sketchbook Pages Watercolor

Black Lilly (aka Devil’s Tongue or Snake Palm)

Post author By Jana Bouc
Post date March 17, 2007
28 Comments on Black Lilly (aka Devil’s Tongue or Snake Palm)

Ink and watercolor in large Moleskine watercolor notebook sketched on site
(Click image to enlarge, select “All Sizes”)

These are some weird plants. We spotted them yesterday on a walk and I couldn’t stop and sketch so I took some photos (see end of post). They look like calla lillies except the part that’s normally white and yellow is nearly black and velvety with bright green stalks. Last night I worked on some thumbnail sketches, trying to make sense of the jumble of leaves and flowers so that I could make a painting of the plant.

Preliminary pencil thumbnail/value study from last night

But I realized I needed more information in order to understand them well enough to paint them. So today, instead of going to the Sketchcrawl in Berkeley, I drove back up to the North Berkeley hills. I found the house and it looked like nobody was home so I set up my little stool in the driveway and started drawing. I was painting when a woman approached me and said, “May I ask what you’re doing?”

“Painting a picture,” I said, holding up the picture to show her. “Is this your house?”

“No, I live next door and I’m trying to get my house out of foreclosure. I get nervous when I see someone studying my house.” (I was sitting facing her house.) She left me alone after telling me the homeowners were away for the weekend but that she shouldn’t be telling me that.

I love the way working outdoors incorporates all the senses. There’s a park nearby and I could hear kids playing soccer and neighbors discussing plumbing and babies, and the whole time I sat there I kept smelling something like fermenting grapes. With the rich purple of the plant, I imagined it was the scent of the flowers, but probably it was coming from a hidden compost bin.

Here’s a photo of the plant. The pink color is a figment of my camera’s imagination but I like it. The flowers actually range from black cherry to black like the one in the foreground with wonderful variations in spring green foliage. I can’t wait to get started on the painting!

UPDATE: I finally found out what this plant is: Dracunculus vulgaris or dragon arum:

“The purplish-red spathe and foul-smelling stench of dragon arum (Dracunculus vulgaris) attracts flies to the base of its erect, flower-bearing spadix. Although it is colorful, this is probably NOT the flower to give to that special someone in a bouquet.”

Tags Pen and Ink

Oil Painting People Photos Sketchbook Pages

Woman at the museum

Oil on canvas board, 12 x 16″
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Thumbnail sketch (1.75×2.5″) in sketchbook for painting

Ink in small Moleskine notebook
(original sketch at SF Museum of Modern Art cafe)

A few weeks ago I went to see the Picasso and American Art exhibit at SFMOMA and was inspired by this woman’s thick, grey hair in a giant clip and the way the teeth of the clip separated her her hair. I also took a photo of her while I was there (below) but the view was different from my drawing so I didn’t end up referring to it when I made the painting. I’m still struggling with oils and acrylics but this one was a little easier because I stuck to black, white and 3 grays. I had intended this to be an underpainting and was going to glaze over it with the colors of eggplant and chocolate but decided to leave it because I like it the way it is.

I used Gamblin Chromatic Black for the darkest darks which is not a dead black pigment like most. From the Gamblin website: “Chromatic Black is black, but it has no black pigment in it. It is made from two perfect complements: Quinacridone Red and Phthalo Emerald.” For the grays I used Gamblin’s Portland Greys in light, medium and deep. So there was no color mixing, just a value study and an attempt to get some control with applying and blending oil paints.

Tags Pen and Ink, Pencil drawing, People, Photos

Outdoors/Landscape Plein Air Sketchbook Pages Watercolor

Cerrito Creek

Ink & watercolor in small Moleskine watercolor notebook
To enlarge, click images, select All Sizes

Today was a glorious sunny day — perfect for a mid-day walk to Peets Coffee. This is Cerrito Creek, a little urban greenway hidden away a block from Peets beside the California Orientation Center for the Blind and Albany Hill in El Cerrito. I got my coffee beans and an iced decaf latte and did these two little sketches.

It was a lovely spot except for the smell of dog pee along the fence I was using as an easel/table. This path must be a favorite dog walking spot. It’s funny how sensory experiences get embedded in a painting done outdoors — souds, wind, sun, friendly people…they’re all in there.

Tonight I tried adding a little Aquacover (a white-out designed for watercolor paper) mixed with some yellow paint to try to put back the falling water and reflections. I’m not sure it worked. Here it is before I added the splashy water.

Tags Pen and Ink, Plein Air