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.

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.

skaneateles

Skaneateles is one of my favorite places on Earth.
The lake reaches right up to the edge of the town, or rather the town reaches right into the lake. The water is clear. Ducks abound. In summer, you can run from the porch of the Sherwood Inn straight down the grassy hill into the water. In winter, thick ice forms on the surface of the lake. Sometimes it breaks into huge clashing plates that make an eerie sound when the wind blows.

The hills in the distance across the lake look pink, green, blue, gray, depending on the weather and the time of day. Boats appear: big touring ones, little sailboats, kayaks, paddle rafts.

The town is kitschy, like the one I grew up in, but lovable, again like the one I grew up in. Its antique stores and thrift stores and libraries burst with the history of the people who live there and have lived there. I picture them all like my Quaker and Puritan relatives: reading crumbly leather-bound books at night, grinding coffee by hand in the morning. Their spirit, strong, stern, boundedly but bloomingly beautiful, lives in every eave and hedge and curb and curve of Skaneateles.

2 views: one while I was there, one a memory-reflection that evening.

excellence

There has been some disagreement between me and my environment - perhaps my whole life, but definitely in the last few months - about what excellence is.

I have spoken out about it before, and will continue to speak out about it, again and again.

Here is what I believe is excellent: being able to immerse yourself in something you care about deeply; exploring it, openly, freely, with passion and heart; being open to learning new things and seeing new points of view, being willing to try new things, being open and honest and clear.

Whatever you create operating in this way will be excellent.

lake day

Yesterday I visited one of my favorite places: Canandaigua Lake. It was sunny and a little bit chilly but there were a lot of people out and I enjoyed sitting on the rocks and looking out over the water. I even got a chance to draw a couple of quick scenes:

rochester

It was a beautiful Easter day. Ansel and I went walking in the sunshine, down by the river, and stopped to sit outside the library so I could draw the view.

katie's studio

I spent a nice afternoon hanging out (like these skeletons ;) ) in Katie's Alexander Technique studio and got some drawings!

The skeleton below has a neon green mustache and a three-cornered hat.

studio 2, x 2

I've been practicing for a drawing of Katie's studio that I plan to do: whenever I have a spare moment I pull out my notebook and do a sketch of my teaching studio. 

Here's one in marker and one in pen, merging together on the page.

studio

I spend a lot of time at this piano.

The thing hanging from one of the cupboard handles is an enormous paper snowflake, made by my friends Marla and Maren!

away

We've been on a boat!
 Perhaps more about that later, but first:

show this friday

Hello everyone! 

Starting this FRIDAY, February 6,

some of my paintings, and some of the beautiful ceramics by my friend Marla Eklund will be on display at Fuego Coffee, 167 Liberty Pole Way, Rochester NY.

Please come by!

Drinks and snacks start at 7 pm.

the outside world

I passed by a girl on the sidewalk today. She was wearing a sweatshirt that said "I <3 dogs" (that <3 was of course a perfect little red heart). As we got closer, I saw that it said under that, in smaller print,

"It's humans that annoy me"

My little <3 felt a little sicker.

I am a human.

I am not, and never will be (in this lifetime at least) a dog, NY, yachting, or anything else that anyone might <3.

I am utterly, irrevocably, completely annoyingly human.

Life has been hard lately. People have annoyed me. I have annoyed other people. The people around me, the people I love, have been annoyed to the point of sickness by other people around them. 

Of course we're all annoyed by the people around us. They have opinions and habits that repel us. They get in our way. They say mean things, or things we perceive as being mean. We don't have the time or energy to deal with them, but we can't imagine a way to not deal with them.

They are hard to <3.

But that girl's sweatshirt, and the soul-sinking (to me) sentiment it expressed, reminded me that we all need to take responsibility.  The outside world, the world of other people, is not the only thing going on, even though we act as though it is. We are not at other people's mercy, though we act as though we were. We are thinking, feeling adults, with inner worlds that we carry around with us all the time. Taking all that stuff in, sorting it, reacting to it or not reacting to it, creating stories around it or deciding not to create stories around it, deciding what to think and feel about it. That is our responsibility.

reservoir

We are having some spectacularly gorgeous fall days. Full of sunshine and stillness. This is the gatehouse to a reservoir at the top of a hill. This hill gets the last of the sunshine on any given day. I did this painting around noontime in full sunshine however, sitting at the bottom of the hill in the shade.

apple time

I spent some time yesterday sitting on the grass between two lines of apple trees.

leah's elephant

I don't know who Leah Samson is, but I know she is an artist. Her cast bronze elephant stands with a bunch of its friends in front of an elementary school in my neighborhood. There is also a dolphin, a lion, a dinosaur, and several other creatures, all with wonderful personalities. This spunky little elephant, though, has a special place in my heart. I often visit him when I'm out on my walks.

bicycle sketching

I live in a great neighborhood. There are towering, shady trees. Beautiful houses, with interesting colors, trim, decorations, porches, plants, lanterns, flags...always something to look at. And on one grand avenue nearby, there are the old mansions of the Rochester city elite: George Eastman's, most notably, and those of all of his cronies and co-citizens, who vied to have the most elegant and elaborate homes.

It is a treat to ride around, run around, walk around.

Recently I rigged up a mobile sketching station on the handlebars of my bike.

Then I cruised around (helmeted, of course) and drew - whatever caught my eye, only as much as I could get while riding by. I was amazed at how much fun it was. The tempo and the situation meant that I couldn't get caught up in anything. It kept my intent pure, my focus pure. It was amazing to see the view of the thing I was drawing changing so quickly. There was flow, and the flow almost became my subject.

I found it funny how unrecognizable so many of the drawings were. And how recognizable elements of others were!

Here are just a few.

sunday evening with plants

Rilke: 

                                                    Wie soll ich meine Seele halten, daß 
                                                    sie nicht an deine rührt?

sketchbummel

Yesterday. They don't come more beautiful.

honesty

I went for a walk tonight. I went mostly just to walk, but ended up at the grocery store. There I bought some cookies, and a bottle of nail polish. The man at the check-out was tall, in a yellow shirt. "Important things here," he said.

"Yes," I said, "Just the essentials."

"You're going to be popular with those...Newman's O's."

In my head I added, "and with my pink nail polish."

On my way back a man with one tooth, sitting at a bus stop, greeted me. "Hi," I said. "You look like you from a different part of the country," he said. "God bless you!"

Now a man on the radio is singing, "All I want...is honesty..."

In my experience, if you want something, you have to give it.

from my sketchbook