Sketchbook Portraits---Prismacolor Before and After

This past week I revisited some of my early portrait attempts with the Prismacolor markers and redrew them.  The results are pretty interesting. My control of the pens is getting much better---I still have a long way to go. In some ways, I like my naive renderings more but I like the new ones too.  Right now I'm experimenting with adding blues, greens and pinks to the face--- trying to make the head look three dimensional.

Here are a few of the makeovers:

Christopher---before

Christopher--- after

Shane---before

Shane---after

La Vonda---before

La Vonda---after

Sketchbook Portraits---This week in Prismacolor

More Prismacolor marker portraits:

Mr. Dombroski

When my older son saw the above one he said, " Oh, you drew Frankenstein" and then my younger one said, "Yah, that was when he was younger before he had the knobs".   That made me laugh although, Frankenstein wasn't my intention. It's the hair, I think, I did a little too much on his left side.

Manley

Colleen

Bryan

And... my boys and I played with some porcelain.  They didn't want to keep their creations but I kept the one I made.  If it makes it through the firing, it will serve as a tray to hold my salt and pepper grinders that now just sit on the kitchen counter and make a sprawling mess. I have a few more functional projects in mind.

porcelain, leather hard stage, 5" x 8 1/2 "

Sketchbook Portraits---Prismacolor and 1984

Some more Prismacolor Marker portraits from this past week:

Mr. Evans

My references are small black and white photos from a 1984 yearbook.  Some of the portraits from the previous posting were also from the same yearbook.  All the different face shapes on a page are so intriguing.  I'm making up the color and most of the shading, playing and experimenting and enjoying these studies immensely.

Mark Kahlhoefer

Marc Stager

Mrs. Lucero

And, I finished the slipcover project. It took me a little longer because I decided to make some pillows. Now the test will see how it works.

Portrait Sketches in Prismacolor

Even though this summer I haven't been able to paint, I draw a little everyday.  For awhile I was doing a portrait a day to practice capturing faces.  In trying different drawing media I fell upon Prismacolor Markers and my drawing people routine morphed into doing some experimental abstract sketches.   Once I felt I was getting the hang of the markers, I returned to doing portraits and now I'm finally getting around to posting some of them (as some are really too bad to share!).  I think they're a bit odd (and a little off) but I'm really loving the medium.  I don't do any preliminary drawing, I just jump right in with the pens.  There's no going back on mistakes---I have to work with the marks I put down.  It's a joy to make these sketches.

Here are some of my favorites in order starting from the most recent (today):

Jonathan Toulin

Mrs. Nolan

Bob Smith

Gloria Smith

Mrs. Martin

Mrs. Sanders

Shane Winfield

LaVonda July

Christopher Koster

The Violin Player

The Chef

Man in Gray

Collaboration

My youngest son and I made this today.  He calls it the Pigheaded Kangaroo.  He made the head and I made the body.  The line at the belly is actually a seam where the lid with the head and the bowl with legs fits together. I think it's my favorite one yet.  I love the way he did the eyes.

Longhorn Red Clay, leather hard stage,  71/2 " tall

Our army of these critters are growing.  One of these days we'll get to glaze them and then I'll take a group photo.

Summer Time

Summer and the last couple of weeks:

When school lets in June our routines and schedules seem to evaporate.   I so enjoy these months but it is difficult to paint.  My boys are young and want to hang out with me (and I want to hang out with them) and I know that before I can blink too many times, that won't be the case---they'll want to be hangin' with their friends, not their mom.  I try to squeeze in painting when I can but I work best when I can do it on a more daily basis with uninterrupted blocks of time. Instead of getting frustrated because that's hard to negotiate and that I'm not painting, I pick projects that I can weave into the rhythm of our days. Right now it's a sewing venture. While I'm working on it, the boys and I orbit around each other. I'll be cutting material on the living room floor while pirate ships are circling about, sword fights are happening overhead (and our dog thinks the freshly spread out material is the best place to lay) or sewing at the table while they're drawing robots etc...---always close to each other. Then we take breaks and go on adventures: to swim, to the movies, to visit friends, to the park, and then return to the house and resume our individual activities. It all makes for a (mostly) peaceful and happy house.

My sewing project now is making a partial slipcover for a antique couch I inherited from my great grandmother.  I know---slipcover---not very exciting, but it is!  I love to sew, especially items of my own invention. The couch is white.  I have three boys and a dog in the house...  For the last couple of years I've draped quilts over it to extend its life --- not a look I like. So, we'll see if my plan works.

I've been thinking of this project since the couch came to me. It's a joy that it's finally coming to fruition.  When it's done, it's so satisfying---well, that is if it looks good---never know until the end.  I think I'll be done next week, I'll post the results.

Study of the Ocean Alla Prima

A few days ago we returned from a splendid family trip to South Padre Island on the Gulf of Mexico.  Before going I had envisioned doing all these small paintings on the beach under my umbrella with my cigar easel box on my lap. I did get to paint several times in such a way but mostly ended up playing in the water and walking along the beach.  It was so lovely.

Below I have posted my attempts to paint the amazing ever changing ocean which I found both extremely difficult and exciting.  I had many, many day dream thoughts of living for long periods of time on the beach so I could paint everyday and figure out how to convey what I was seeing. 

Day One: 

Studies in watercolor with thoughts of how I would paint in oil.  So much to see--- horizon gradations, folding of the waves,  reflections from the sky on the water, reflections of the cresting waves on the surface, the wet sand....

watercolor on paper

watercolor on paper

Day Two:
My first try in oil of the waves and sand.   So many colors in the water, it was hard to keep it simple.

4 1/2" x 6 3/4" oil on linen panel

Day Three:
Trying again to understand the waves and the sand as the light continually changes and the waves come and go.

4" x 7 1/2" oil on linen panel

Day Four:
Study from the balcony.

watercolor on paper

Day Five:
More studies from the balcony.

watercolor on paper

Day Six:
After an afternoon of swimming, my last painting done from the balcony. I could of stayed there for a year....

6"x8" oil on linen panel

Needle and Thread

6 x 6 inches, oil on panel

I love sewing.  I always enjoy sitting at my old Singer.  It's a beautiful machine from 1940 that just goes forward and backward, and I think weighs than my youngest son.   My favorite projects are inventing my own patterns or trying to alter something.  I'm mostly self-taught so it's always an adventure when I try to make  something... oh,  so much to learn.

Red Tin Can

6 x 6 inches, oil on panel

This is inspired by a DPW challenge to do an image incorporating polka dots. I have a few other paintings in the works that I have been stuck on lately so it was nice to put them aside and try this one. My favorite part is the bright red above the shadow of the shell.  My kids wanted to title it 'Mutant Snail' because the shell is unusually large in comparison to the ones we often find around our house.

Sketchbook Portrait- Our Friend CJ

watercolor & charcoal on paper

Mother's Day Collaboration

For Mother's Day my request was to get to play in some clay out in the backyard with my boys. It couldn't of been a prettier day. This is what we made:

bird head painted with yellow and white slip

longhorn red clay, leather hard stage, 6" tall

frankenstein head painted with green slip

 Happy Mother's Day!

Stand Oil

7 x 4 1/2 inches, oil on hardboard

Sketchbook Portrait- Jenna

watercolor and graphite

This is from a 20 minute pose at a life drawing session I attended today.  I haven't posted a sketchbook portrait in awhile as I had taken a break from doing them---I think I was getting tired of looking at a photo for reference.  Having a live model is much better.

Cactus Blooms

 3 1/2 x 5 inches, oil on canvas panel, 2011

I just noticed that the cactus on the side of our house has bloomed which reminded me of this small study I had done around this time last year.

Monday Morning

7 x 4 1/2 inches, oil on hardboard

This is a view from the same general area as my two previous plein air paintings. While I was working, I periodically heard the mooing of unseen cows which only added to the already idyllic scene.  I think two wandered into that far left meadow just as I was leaving.  I'd like to go back and paint this spot again.

The Stare

3 1/2 x 5 inches, oil on canvas panel, 2011

This is one of many male Boat-tailed Grackles that inhabit our city. I'm endlessly fascinated by their intelligence, confidence, and beauty.
I painted this last spring.
(sold)

Thistles

7 x 4 1/2 inches, oil on hardboard

This morning's plein air adventure took us to the same spot as last Wednesday.  My initial intention was to do a painting of a single thistle but instead, I found myself lured by this scene.  
I attached a tiny bungee cord to my panel and it held up perfectly in the wind---no flying off to land in the dirt today!

Sky

3 1/5 x 5 inches, oil on canvas panel, 2011

About this time last year, I painted this small study of the sky seen through the canopy of trees.  I did a series of them and this one was my favorite.
(sold)

Out in the Field

4 1/2 x 7 inches, oil on hardboard

My youngest son and I went on a hike this morning.  I set up a place to paint and he laid out a blanket from which to catch butterflies, play on his Gameboy and draw. Pretty idyllic even when the wind picked up and blew my panel face down in the dirt!  I had to wipe a bunch off but I think I was able to salvage it.
I could have stayed out there all day.

Peach Blossoms

This morning I found on our Loquat tree two sweet ripe loquats beckoning to be painted.   I went inside to do a few things and gather my materials to paint.  Earlier, I had told my boys 'don't touch the loquats until I get to paint them'. Well, while inside getting prepared, my boys were outside playing and 'forgot' and ate my loquats.  Sigh...

There's still loquats high up on the tree.  Maybe I could sacrifice a little branch and paint inside---later, if the mood returns.

This is one of the peach blossoms paintings that I did last spring.  This year the flowers came and went before I got a chance to paint them.  The young peaches are already the size of walnuts.

3 1/2 x 5 inches, oil on canvas board
(sold)

Past Poppies

7 x 5 inches, oil on Crescent board

Another of my pre-blog paintings. This was last April's poppies. 

Recovering from a bout of food poisoning this last week, hope to be back to painting soon.

(sold)

Glass Pitcher with Purple Heart

 
5 x 7 inches, oil on canvas board

This is from a series of small paintings I had done before starting my blog.  I really like that glass pitcher, it belongs to my mother-in-law.  I just borrowed it again with some new paintings in mind...

Young Pods

5 x 5 inches, oil on panel