Sketchbook Project #18: The End of Chardonnay

During this most dreary month of the year with nothing but cold, gray, wet, freezing days, remembrances of cool chardonnay under sunny skies is a nice interlude.

Sketchbook Project #12: Tuilerie Pond Sailing in Paris

In the Jardin de Tuileries in Paris, youngsters, and I suppose, others too, can rent these sailboats and sail them about the pond. I've searched and searched online for set of plans so I could make one these beauties. What I am beginning to realize is that it wouldn't be as difficult as originally thought. Some wood, some dowels, some heavy twine, some heavy cloth -brightly colored, and there you go.

Shall we go sailing?

Sketchbook Project #11: The Columbia Gorge

Last summer we drove through the gorge both on the way, and on the way home, to and from the Oregon Coast. If you've never driven through the gorge, you've missed one of Mother Nature's masterpieces; especially in that section a little further east where the trees have disappeared and what you get is the basalt cliffs on the Oregon side and those lovely, soft, and very sensual hills on the Washington side.

This sketch was a bit of a challenge because what I was really working on here was the perspective on the water. When your eye is on the horzon line with water, you can't really see it very well. Also I had a problem to solve with the foreground. I don't really like all those big rocks blocking the view, but without them the perspective seemed all out of whack.

Sketchbook Project #10: "Tough Guy"

So, after completing the graphite sketch of the "Old Man" below, I decided to get out one of my charcoal pencils and give another headshot a try. I found this guy at http://www.mugshots.com/; he's a real bad guy.

I'm not interested in either his name, or his crime, only his face. I've looked at mugshot sites before and found some characters there have amazingly interesting facial features. This guy's isn't necessarily one of those, but I thought he was interesting enough to spend a few minutes with.

If you know him, tell him I said, "hey."

Sketchbook Project #9: "The Old Man"

The sketch says, "The old man challenged me to sketch him in 5 mins. So I did." That's just for publication as my theme with the "Sketchbook Project," is "in 5 mins." I'm not sure exactly what that means and I think the orginators of the project intended it that way; so I was trying to be "cute" with some kind of comment with each sketch having a comment with that phrase, "in 5 mins" in it. After this sketch, I decided to quit doing that and just add sketches from where ever.

I found the reference photo for this image online. I probably should provide a link or something to it, but I didn't. It doesn't really matter though because an artist's rendition isn't subject to legal scrutiny. I don't think.

Anyway, for a year or so I have been trying to learn how to work ink pens. They are far more limiting than graphite and charcoal, so with this sketch I went back to graphite. It was much more enjoyable to work on this than almost all of those inked sketches I been posting for so long.

I think I'll do another one of these, and if I do, you can find it posted just above this one.

Sketchbook Project #6: "Red-Haired Girl"

I am rather wishing I hadn't signed up for this Sketchbook Project project. I got in late, as the deadline to send the sketchbook is January 15, 2011, and I have about a gazillion pages left in this sketchbook they sent. I could rip out some pages, and some of the others say they have, so I think I will continue until I am either sick to death of the whole thing, or until I get to the end of the book.


Finding something to draw is a challenge. I went out into the community for the first few. I prefer sketching places and people in the tri-cities; but I prefer to do it on nice days. The past couple of days have been cold, gray, and rainy.

The next-best option to head into the internet to find images to draw. I belong to flickr.com where there are literally hundreds of thousands of images. This one came from a group in flickr known as "Julia Kay's Portrait Project," where people send in photos of their faces and then they all have this orgy of drawing each other's schnoz's. I belong, but I haven't sent in a pic of myself yet. Too vain, I guess.

Anyway, I found "Marga" and found her "wig" interesting. I'm afraid I've botched, rather badly, this pretty woman's face, but, as I've said before, "Hey, it's art and that's all you can do about it." Or something like that.

Actually, I was quite surprised to see a former student of mine emerge when sketching Marga. If you know, or knew, Miss Sharon Rupert, former student from Prosser High School, then you probably see her here too, sorta, kinda. well, maybe not. Sharon is much prettier than this sketch would lead anyone to believe.

Sharon?

Sketchbook Project #4: "Little League Park"

I noticed in the news the other day that Pat Prudhomme passed away. I never met the woman, nor her husband, Chet, but they owned "Prudhomme Hardware" here in Kennewick for many years. When I was a Little Leaguer I played for "Prudhomme Hardware." They supplied us with uniforms, bats, and baseballs; and in those days the uniforms looked sharp. In this little park I remember hitting a couple, or more, homeruns by smacking the ball into those trees on the far side of the park. They were much smaller trees then as that was in the late '50's. Great memories.

"The Sketchbook Project #3: Library Man"

Libraries provide perfect opportunities to draw people who aren't "on the move" like they are in food marts and other places where they are in a big hurry. Library patrons move very slowly, whether they are studying, writing, reading, computing, or some cases, knapping.

This gentlemen sat very quietly reading his magazine, and though I commented that "with-in 5 mins, he finished," he didn't really. The theme for my sketchbook is, "In 5 mins.....," so I have decided to pepper my comments with that short phrase, somewhere, in each sketch. It's the best I could come up with.

"Sketchbook Project #2: Brulant's

This is the only place I know where instead of building a "quicky" mart, where one can purchase groceries with gasoline, they created a coffee-bagel-smoothie shop instead. I am on my second punch-card as I find their coffee and their service - top notch.

I had my first smoothie here last summer, a raspberry oral explosion that came close to addicting me. But I stood the test and only had one more after that one.

"The Sketchbook Project #1: Starbucks"

I found "The Sketchbook Project" online and my vanity got the best of me. The project is one where participants enter their sketchbooks into the Brooklyn Library where they will be barcoded, scanned and entered into their permanent collection.

Each time anyone views a participant's sketchbook, it is logged as such and the participant receives an email notifying him/her that someone has viewed their book.

I thought it all sounded like fun, so I joined up. $25 USD gets you the book and all the benefits of having it housed, forever, in the Brooklyn Library.

The problem, for me, arose once I opened the envelop and inspected the sketchbook. It is filled with what makes me think, "cheap moleskine" paper. The pages are very thin and will show ink marks on through to the next page; and they are not friendly to watercolor, just like the regular non-watercolor moleskines.

The instructions do say that the paper can be replaced, but I don't want to bother with all that. I'm not sure I even know how to do that.

So, we'll do the best we can with what we have, while we have it. ok?

ink, watercolor, 5x8 sketchbook project sketchbook