Monday, April 28, 2014

Playing with my peas

(click to enlarge)

I'm in an experimental phase. I think we all go through these times—either we're tired of what we've been doing, or we're just wanting to get out of our comfort zones a bit. Or maybe we we're stuck with a drawing of some lovely English peas that is looking more than a little blah—and we need to try something to salvage it. I'm not sure where this one went awry, but I was totally overworking it and wasn't sure what to do. I decided to take my .005 Micron pen and cross-hatch it a bit. (Alright, I'll admit that I was trying—in vain—to channel my idol, John Burgoyne...)

I think that the pen-over-colored-pencil combination is something to explore, but I'm finding that it calls for a different sort of "underpainting" with the pencil, leaving more shading to be done with the hatching .

So my experimentation continues. I'm not sure if it's the things I'm seeing in Danny Gregory's Sketchbook School, or my weekly life drawing class, or the beautiful spring weather, but int'll be interesting to see where all of this restlessness leads!

8 comments:

  1. I do love what you do, Sarah, but I'm also really pleased that you're trying new stuff out.

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  2. What if you scratched the pencil with an Xacto knife to give the micron pen something to grab onto? Not 100% sure if this would work, but I might try it if I were in a similar mood to try new things. I enjoyed looking at John's work, but I've enjoyed your work longer :) Keep drawing!

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  3. Your peas are lovely. I don't think I've ever tried ink over colored pencil. The ink doesn't "slide off"?
    JB - oh yes, how many back covers of Cook's have I drooled over in the check-out line. Other people throw chips or candy or People in the cart as an impulse buy - I buy Cook's!

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  4. Just found your blog and love your drawings. I see that you are in NOCA! I live in Los Gatos. I also love Cook's for the back covers! I have two questions for you. Where do you take your weekly life drawing class? Do you ever do workshops/demos?

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    1. Thanks for the kind remarks. Annie! Yes, I live in Willow Glen in San Jose...not far! And no, I've never done demos or workshops, but I'm flattered that you think I could. I found the life drawing group through meetup.com. If you go there and search for "San Jose Lifedrawing", you should see it. Do you know about the group that meets every Tuesday afternoon in Los Gatos at the LG Museums Gallery?

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    2. I have a small watercolor journal meetup group that is an off shoot of Gay Kraeger/Christina Lopp Illustrated Watercolor Journal class that started att the Los Gatos Parks/Rec Dept. We have been getting together for almost 3 years now. We are not on meetup.com. We meet every Friday in San Jose, Los Gatos, or Santa Cruz. We would love for you to come and share your work. I am sure I could collect a stipend to cover your expenses. Your first mini workshop! It might be fun and we are all beginners/ intermediate artists and very friendly. I have thought about the LG Museum Tues. class, but I was too intimidated to go. I will check out the SJ Lifedrawing, but it sounds scary too. If think you might be interested in being a quest at our meetup, please let me know.

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    3. Hi Annie, Could you contact me directly thru my email link on my profile so that I have your email address? Thanks!

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