negative, positive

Time flies!

I have been drawing with a broad-nibbed Pilot Parallel pen belonging to Ansel. It's incredible. Totally unwieldy, totally unpredictable.

I enjoy its thick, fat marks and the fact that they could either indicate negative or positive space. Who's to say what's what, anyway? And that one can't transform into the other?

from the archives

hello

Hello out there, loyal readers, casual stopper-byers, people stumbling across this blog by accident. Hello, hello! I'm taking this opportunity to say hello since I haven't posted in a while.

There are so many reasons for this. I won't regale you with them; instead I'll tell you that I recently made an inner pledge to draw just a little bit more and since I was on my way to yoga class right as I made that pledge, I brought with me a little sketchbook and my favorite brush pen (thank you again, Ansel) and drew people as they warmed up.

Then I went to work and right before my first student appeared I had time to sketch these cute birds from the bird calendar hanging on the wall in my studio:

I love the action in the picture above.

I have been reading about Goethe, who struggled with reconciling different parts of himself: the artist, the man, the member of society, the efficacious maker of policies and shaper of civil life.

He wanted to be it all, cultivate it all: he felt it all within himself, could not let one part die so that another could live. 

That, he felt, would be an untruth.

As far as I can tell what he felt, of course.

Here's what I can share with you about Goethe with certainty:

something's happening

I'm just not exactly sure what.
I got a clue, though, while I was drawing in one of my favorite places in the world:

Skaneateles.

Aptly and justly nicknamed Jewel of the Finger Lakes.

Anyway, I found myself not doing the work to actually look at things, work with them, be with them, create them as living as I could on the page. I was taking shortcuts.

On one drawing I actually scrawled: "Lazy!"

As a description of myself. 

I don't recommend name-calling as part of one's self-talk repertoire, but there it is. It happens.

I felt BORED.

I seldom feel bored.

But again, there it is. It happens.

I think boredom - or at least, my boredom - is a sign of emotional exhaustion. It becomes difficult to care, so you don't. And because you don't care, you don't pay attention, and the world of beautiful gesture, color and detail no longer reveals itself to you.

That's ok.

If I'm emotionally, mentally, physically exhausted, it means I need to rest.

I might have to step back, rethink some things, get a new perspective.

The next day I looked at this maple seed and it was beautiful:

So I spent some time with it, immersing myself in its gradations of color, its subtle undulations, its presence, weight and weightlessness.

That felt good.

bugs

It's been one of those times when the only drawing I do is doodling on to-do lists. 

Someone who knew about these things once told me "there's no such thing as 'bugs'". And yet, here they are.

random drawings

Katie allowed me to draw her - this isn't her, but it captures something about her. And she requested a ruff, after I said I'd made her look like a young Shakespearean actor.

San Francisco, and its patron saint, have been on my mind.

People in water.

just 4 days late

to honor This Guy:

guest artist sara fraser!

Here is a downright beautiful representation of what can happen when we allow ourselves to become part of the music. Conceived of and drawn by one of my students, Sara Fraser - who very graciously allowed me to share it here.

bartok

This man, I think, said what he had to say in the only way he had to say it.

seamus coleman...and what i've been up to

In my spare moments, I've been making notebooks. Notebooks out of junk mail, flyers, foam board, old containers, sardine can boxes, etc etc...

small ones, long ones, tall ones, weird ones, straight-laced ones.

Many of them have landed with Ansel, being my beloved and directly in the line of fire (as well as a great source of inspiration and helpful suggestions).

So when Seamus Coleman, right-back for Everton FC, suffered his horrific leg break as a result of a nasty tackle in an Ireland-Wales game and Ansel asked me: "Can I commission a notebook?",

"Of course," I said.

He designed it, I made it.

Our hearts go out to Coleman, who always shows up, always works his hardest, always brings a million things to the table.

creatures for march

Hello, hello! Meet this horned lizard, whom I've named Theo. He's ready to cuddle.

And here are the Birdlets of Chivor!

things living and no longer living

mid-january musings

snowman joy

Friends, I'm still here!

A terrible cold over the holidays left me with little energy to do anything but - strangely - learn languages on my computer. So there was no drawing or painting really but some doodling! Ansel got me this wonderful pen. To wield it is to see a world unfold.

kale x 2

Ansel has always loved the Public Market, our enormous central farmers' market. He got up before dawn every week to go there and get his pick of the best vegetables.

When we met, I loved eating vegetables, but I did not love washing vegetables. "When you wash them, they're so sparkling, and fresh!" he said. He reminded me of how beautiful they are.

Now we go together to get the vegetables (but he still washes them).

happy belated thanksgiving!

In the spirit of gratitude, here are 2 mugs - definitely empty, but waiting to be filled. Drawn with some beautifully sumptuous watersoluble graphite, pressed into my hand to try by Marla.

my studio

I spend a lot of time at this cute little piano with cracks in its soundboard...

and with this violin, peeking here from under its blanket...

and looking across the room at this little cupboard.

skull

In the place where Ansel and I lift weights (his mother's basement, adjacent to her pottery studio, full of treasures), this skull is hanging. It is beautiful, and strange. I have been wanting to draw it for a while, and finally I did, today during a break. Later I asked Marla about it. Apparently he was a gift from a friend in New Mexico, something Marla wanted because of her love for Georgia O'Keefe. Yes. It all makes sense!

Done with Stockmar beeswax block crayons again, proving to be lots of fun.

He is so beautiful, there may be more drawings, in different mediums.

happy international fountain pen day!

I peacefully coexist with at least 10 fountain pens. I don't know how it happened; it just did. There was the Waterman. Then, finally, the Pelikan.  3 "vintage" ones of my mom's. And then Ansel got a Kaweco, and a Rotring.

All in all we get along great. A long time ago, there was an incident with a bottle of royal blue Pelikan ink, my backpack, and a cement floor in front of my locker in high school...but no one remembers that. Oh yes, and the parent of a girl I babysat who called me over and met me at the door with the old Sheaffer fountain pen I'd given his daughter, safely housed in a plastic ziplock bag. "I don't know what you meant, giving her this, but please take it back, we don't want it in the house." 

Okay. Not for everyone. But definitely for me! Hooray for fountain pens, dangerous, messy, unpredictable, beautiful, small and mighty.

Featured here: Pelikan fountain pen with Pelikan turquoise ink; Pilot Petit-1 fountain pen with J. Herbin mostly Lierre sauvage and a little Vert pré green ink; Pilot Cavalier fountain pen with J. Herbin mostly Gris nuage and a little Perle noire ink, Waterman fountain pen with a different mix of J. Herbin Vert pré and Lierre sauvage (ne jamais mélanger deux encres différentes notwithstanding)

shrews

Some animals are not as cute as their stylized depictions. Not so shrews! They are super-cute. They are turbo-charged cute. They are unbearably, cringingly cute.

Look them up!

PS this drawing was done with Stockmar Waldorf-approved crayons. I did not use them in a Waldorf-approved way. Because I'm just a rebel, what can I do?