A Wordless Work-in-Progress

The Tale of the Abandoned Watermelon

Prismacolor colored pencils on Strathmore Bristol, vellum, approx 3" x 3"

Oh, it started out simply enough: The beautiful patterns in the rinds of the small, seedless watermelons at the grocery store were calling my name.

When I got home, I set up my "model" to do the base drawing. Sometimes what appears to be a simple rounded shape can be one of the trickiest to draw. A "flexible curve" is an amazingly helpful tool. I've had this one for ages, since my designer days, but you can find a similar one wherever art/drafting supplies are sold. You just bend it around until you have the curve you want, and then lay it on your paper and use it as a template. Nifty!

Then I did some not-so-pretty swatches to figure out how to achieve the colors in the rind. As you probably know, with colored pencils, it's all about layering. I often pull out some reference books for ideas. Three of my favorites for this are Botanical Portraits with Colored Pencils by Ann Swan, Painting Light with Colored Pencil by Cecile Baird, and Colored Pencil Solution Book by Janie Gildow.                   .

One tip that I learned ages ago (probably from one of those three books) is that a very light layer of Canary Yellow under the greens of a botanical piece will add a lot of light and life.

Well, at this point, I got overwhelmed. I was trying to do a life-sized drawing, and even though it was a very small melon, it seemed a bit daunting (and more than a bit boring) to fill in the whole thing. I thought, should I cut it in half to expose the center? Nah...the red center always gets all of the attention. I decided to sleep on it.

The next day, it dawned on me: my little botanical/nature heart series! A while back I started these as a way to explore textures in a small piece—almost like doing swatches. In the end, I had so much fun working on this, and I know that if I'd tried to fill in that bigger watermelon piece, I'd have gone a little nutso. I just don't have that kind of patience. Here's a little overview of the process:

Canary Yellow and Tuscan Red

adding Indigo Blue

Olive Green, Dark Green...and  a few other greens!

If you'd like to see the other hearts in this series, start here.

Happy watermelon-eating August to you! 

P.S. The last of my travel posts will be up shortly.

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Beatrix Potter's Lake District

© National Trust

Don't worry, I don't intend to recap my whole vacation on my blog, but since so many of you are artists and book lovers (especially children's books), I'm sharing some things related to those passions. 

Here we go! After Oxford (the previous post), we hit the road to head up to the Lake District. (Actually, we toured Blenheim Palace and Warwick Castle, but I can only bore you with share so much here.) I was still a bit nervous about being a passenger on the left side of the car, but sights like this lightened things up...

click to enlarge all photos...

...as did a stop at a service center—so much fun to peruse a British candy aisle.

Arriving in lovely Windermere, we drove right onto the ferry to get to Near and Far Sawrey, Beatrix Potter's stomping grounds. She was actually quite instrumental in preserving much of the land that is now part of the Lake District National Park—just another reason to love her! We stayed in a beautiful inn called Ees Wyke Country House, and the scenery was breathtaking. Miss Potter actually stayed here on holiday:

"It was taken for granted that the two young Potters would continue to accompany their parents on holiday even when they were grown up, and Beatrix was nearly thirty when they all went to Sawrey for the first time in 1896. The property that Rupert Potter took that year on the edge of the village was a large country house, Lakefield, which by their return in 1900 had been renamed Eeswyke or 'house on the shore'. From the pretty garden there was the magnificent view over Esthwaite Water to the hills of Coniston beyond, and behind the attractive whitewashed house was a bustling farm with sheep and cows and pigs. Beatrix took her pet rabbit, Peter, with her, the coachman took his cat, and during their stay Beatrix and Bertram drew and painted, went for long walks on the fells or drove round the district in the pony and trap."

—from the National Trust book, Beatrix Potter and Hill Top

The owners of the inn have two friendly Old English sheepdogs, Harry and Teddy, which made the place even more charming. Sitting outside, you could hear the sheep on the hillside...it was idyllic, to be sure.

A little weary of braving the driving on very narrow country roads, the next day we decided to skip the trip to the Pencil Museum in Keswick, and relax and enjoy this area. Sawrey and Hawkshead are full of Potter lore, and none of it is overly tourist-y, amazingly enough.

It was just a short walk up the road from the inn to visit Hill Top House, Beatrix Potter's home. There's hardly a wooden or metal fence to be found anywhere in this area. Just miles and miles of these gorgeous stone walls:

We passed this little inn, the Tower Bank Arms...

which can be seen in this illustration from The Tale of Jemima Puddleduck:

©Frederick Warne & Co.

We arrived at Hill Top House, knowing that the house was closed on Fridays (as I mentioned in this previous post), but the grounds and gardens were open. It turned out to be a great time to visit, since there were fewer people.  It was a beautiful day, and so many of her stories and illustrations went through my head as we wandered through this charming place. You can see glimpses of the house and garden in many of her illustrations:

both illustrations from The Tale of Tom Kitten 

©Frederick Warne & Co.

from The Tale of Jemima Puddleduck

©Frederick Warne & Co.

We then drove into nearby Hawkshead, where her husband's former office has been converted to a museum and gallery by the National Trust. Seeing her original artwork was nothing short of amazing. I didn't take pictures in there, but I did manage to take a few of our lunch that followed!

Sigh...we could have stayed for weeks in the magnificent Lake District. But, we had a train to catch...

The last "travel post" will follow soon: a quick recap of Paris and London. I know, no one needs to see another photo of someone standing in front of the Eiffel Tower. I'll keep it blogging/art/book related, I promise!

Note: Just after I published this post, I saw a great piece on today's Buzzfeed: 11 Reasons Beatrix Potter was the Most Charming Pen Pal Ever. It's wonderful...check it out here.

Home again, home again...

I'm back! Well, physically I've been back from my trip to England for ten days, but the first five or six found me quite jet-lagged and foggy-brained. I am just now feeling like I'm approaching normalcy (or at least my version of normalcy).

Since I'm just getting back into drawing mode, I have no new drawing to post. But I thought I would share a few highlights, in the next few days, that might be of interest to my fellow artists and book lovers. First up...the Bodleian Library at the University of Oxford!

When I arrived for the tour at the appointed time, the woman at the gate told me that I was the first to arrive. "You may go through those double doors and wait inside for the others."  Well, I was already rather awestruck being among the gorgeous buildings of Oxford, so I'm fairly sure that I gasped audibly when I entered this "waiting room":

(I know, the photo is a bit fuzzy...I was a tad overwhelmed.) Formerly the Divinity School, it's an exquisite room. (It may also be known to you as the Hogwarts infirmary.) Our tour guide was fascinating and extremely knowledgeable. As we climbed the stairs and toured the centuries-old Duke Humfrey's Library, we learned that, since its creation around 1600 through current day, all readers (students and staff) in all of the libraries that make up the Bodleian have been required to take this oath:

They are so serious about this oath that Duke Humfrey's library was only used in daylight hours until electric lights were invented. And when the library stood in for Hogwarts' library in the film, the flame on Harry's candle had to be inserted digitally!

We were then taken into the Radcliffe Camera. I was so excited; the public can only enter these rooms on certain tours. No photography was allowed, but I'll easily remember those gorgeous round reading rooms. 

After the tour, we went through the "Magical Books" exhibition at the Bodleian where we saw original sketches by C.S. Lewis, J. R. R. Tolkien and Phillip Pullman. Click here if you're interested; much of the exhibition can be seen online.

We then walked over to the Ashmolean Museum to see the Master Drawings exhibit. Click here for more information. While there were stunning drawings from many famous artists, I was especially drawn to (no pun intended) this self-portrait and this sketch by Samuel Palmer.

One last thing—while I toured the Bodleian, my husband climbed to the top of one of the church towers and took these panoramic shots of Oxford. (Click to enlarge.) Such a beautiful town...enjoy!

Next up: Beatrix Potter's stomping grounds, and meeting a British blogging friend...in person!

Old Books

Prismacolor colored pencil on Strathmore Charcoal paper. "Pottery Green"

“It is a good rule after reading a new book, 
never to allow yourself another new one till you have read an old one in between.” 

— C.S. Lewis

I love old books, so when I saw this week's topic on Illustration Friday, "worn", I had to look no further than the bookshelf next to my desk. I've always liked how these four looked together, in their green and blue covers. I might have gone overboard using the grey-green paper, but I like how their faded covers sort of fade into the paper.

I've drawn books before (here) and I always have a grand time doing them. I've thought about doing a series, but I'm a big fan of artist Jane Mount's book series, and worry that I'm not being original—not that my work is all that similar to hers. I guess it's time to re-read this wonderful little book that I have,  Steal Like an Artist by Austin Kleon. It's enlightening, inspiring, and great fun to read.

Speaking of books, I mentioned in a recent post that I'm going to visit the home of Beatrix Potter on my upcoming trip to England. Well, in my travel planning, I somehow neglected to see that her house isn't open on Fridays...the day I'll be there. Grrr. I tried to console myself with the fact that there will be a smaller crowd and I can still see the outside and the gardens. But what really cheered me up was the fact that, a few minutes later, I got the last online reservation for one of the infrequent tours of the Bodleian Library at Oxford, and the tour includes going into the not-usually open-to-the public Radcliffe Camera.  (I'm such a library geek.) And when I read the description of the exhibition that's on while I'm there, I forgot all about Beatrix and her not-open-on Fridays abode. Check out the amazing exhibition here.

I'll be back home on July 13, so I hope to give you a full report!