Winter Sketching

Winter can be so bleak but I am always so excited to see all the beautiful trees loose their leaves and I am able to see their naked frames. Trees can have the most beautiful structures. To think when spring comes that thousands of little leaves will find their way beautifying this graceful beauty once more.

This drawing/sketch seemed a little two-dimensional because I spent so much time given texture to the tree that I didn't spend much time on value and light study. Interesting nonetheless.

Technorati Tags: Journal, Sketch, Watercolor

Sketching in Church

Here am I enjoying my time listening [maybe enjoying drawing a little bit more ;)] to the speakers at Sacrament Meeting at two separate times. I find that as I am sketching people that I really need to observe keenly so I can get a satisfying sketch. Usually I rush because people are moving too quickly and I really stink at capturing people on the move. These drawings focus on either other Ward members listening intently or sleeping.

One of my serious goals is to study and understand figure drawing. I really want to excel at gesture studies like Sketchcrawl creator- Enrico Casarosa

A New Direction

As much fun it is to post these drawings - it seems to take a lot of time to spend scanning, proofing, editing, and posting to the internet .... etc. etc. than I find I have time to do. Mostly I find that I am able to do this on Sunday evenings as the family is winding down and myself as well.

So....I think I will take a new direction at posting only on the weekends so I can feasibly take the time and not feel forced to do something I actually enjoy. If not I don't find myself posting at all. Actually, I am drawing quite a bit lately- meeting and exceeding my 2006 goals I set. So Tonight I present the sketches I have produced over past couple of weeks....

Nostalgia & Technology

Last Weekend I took my three kids (11, 5 and 2) to the BYU Museum of Art to find some sketching material. I planned ahead and brought their sketch books, crayons, coloring books etc. to get them in the mood as well. The MOA had a exhibit called "Nostalgia and Technology" which was a historical look at industrial design or daily ephemera that our parents and grandparents would use day to day. These items were truly works of art. Well, the plan worked at first and I was able to get two sketches done - about 45 minutes until they started to loose it. I put away the sketchbooks and decided to wander through the other exhibits.

I have found that 1 1/2 hours is max for a museum visit for this curious "touchy feely" group. As soon as they got climbing on sculpture (yikes!!!!) and touching a Andy Warhol "Marilyn" and the visiting Maynard Dixson pieces I knew it was time to take a quick exit before security kicked us out with a resounding "do not come back".

Next time I might try the Bean Museum of natural history-- stuffed taxidermy would make great sketch subjects without raining security on top of us. Oh well, they all told their red-faced dad that "it was really fun" and when could we go back again? I had to think on this one a little more carefully.

Technorati Tags: Journal, Sketch, Watercolor

2006 Goals

Members of the EDM group have been talking about art goals for 2006 and I have thought about what I wanted to do this year as well.

1. Two drawings per week (would love to move up to daily sketching- but I have yet to prove it to myself- so I will set a realistic goal).
2. Make three sketchbooks- my next sketchbook, a sketchbook just for color studies, and a sketchbook for figure sketching/painting.
3. Redesign web log- with the intent to get a Wordpress site up and going.

When I first started to pick up my sketchbook frequently again (back in 2000) I struggled with the idea of "making time". I finally found out late 2003 that if I could make my sketchbook small and light and get a sketching kit that I could take everywhere I go I could finally make the time. The time being found in the found times in between everything else in our busy life. It started to work and I not only began to improve and enjoy myself as I would hope but I found that I wanted to do more.

Soon I found like-minded people on the web and got inspired by all of the great work they were doing and found that this little sketchbook I was carrying around with me was actual a graphic journal. I have really taken strongly to this idea and found that I didn't need to create large gallery type pieces of art- my art was a take along in progress work in the form of my sketchbook.

I have enjoyed sketching but found I was disappointed in the sketchbooks available and the watercolor sketchbooks were too expensive and too large for my needs. I decided to make a sketchbook which at first became a spiral bound book of bristol paper then I quickly went to arches hot press water color paper. Then last spring I was inspired by others on the web to make my own hand stitched watercolor sketchbook. Now after 50 sketch pages later I am about to finish and begin another. This last sketchbook has already became a treasured piece that has my little children always asking to see what I've done new. The sketches and paintings of my kids have become favorites and they always look at them and talk about what I've done. I can see now it will become an important heirloom to our children and their future posterity. It could be considered art by others but now it is too precious to us as a family heirloom.

Since 2004 I have made five spiral bound sketchbooks (my first attempts) and I'm just finishing up filling my first hand stitched hardbound Fabriano 140# Hot Press sketchbook. Part of my goals this year is to make three more sketchbooks (already accomplished) - I now need to concentrate on sketching daily (eventually) without sacrificing my family, church and professional responsibilities. I have found that sketching has been an incredible boost to my sanity and helping me maintain a personal creative output (and really a more happy person as well). Whenever I have felt down and focusing on the problems at hand I have stopped sketching- I then have to pull myself up by the bootstraps and begin again- it is easy once I start but that inner critic tells my I can't and shouldn't. Sketching is truly great therapy.

Technorati Tags: Journal

Landscape Painting

I admit it. I am a sucker for Landscape paintings. Although most of my free time, it seems, I find myself inside waiting for this or that or sitting in a boring meeting with thoughts escaping to one of these pastoral images. I have several colleagues and friends (those I can talk to about art and more cerebral topics) who are enamored with modern art. I appreciate modern art but to me they affect me like a color study affects me; it is interesting and somehow I come away smarter but it doesn't make a connection to my heart. Not like a landscape or a figure study of a friend, my children or my wife- it connects to my heart- brings back incredible feelings to the time I first laid paint to paper- it captures for me a moment in time and the feelings I felt when I was carried away to that unforgettable place where time stops and all I can hear is the beating of my heart and that which is in front of me.

This scene which is becoming more and more rare in our backyard. More and more faceless and soulless homes are filling in around us and they seem not only more of them but incomprehensibly larger. I think minimalists like D. Price go a little too far in living so simply that they erase themselves from existence. But I would rather be a neighbor to a million D. Price's out there than the 6,000 sf McMansions that are sprouting up everywhere around us- being purchased by those who really can't afford it and who eventually lose it to bankruptcy. I think the Joneses should be locked up.

There probably only 4 colors used in this sketch but they convey what I saw and felt. My pallete of paints are increasing in the earth tones and decreasing on the primaries.

Technorati Tags: Journal, Sketch, Watercolor

Brutal Life

Here I am sketching from the National Geographic again. I can't help but become absorbed in some of these images. I was really intrigued by this particular image, it is of an elephant in an Elephant Hospital (who would of thought) recovering from stepping on a landmine. His one leg became in an instant a clump of flesh.

The colors in this sketch came off really well. The combination of grays, red and yellow make a good complement. Go figure that I'm working with Ultramarine blue and Burnt Sienna again (my favorite color mixing duo) and some cad yellow and burnt sienna as highlights. Sometimes less is more- working with a palette of a few colors makes all of the difference.

Technorati Tags: Journal, Sketch, Watercolor

Drawing the Moving Figure

Sketching people is hard enough without having them move all over the place as you are sketching them. I've been reading a lot lately about how to get the spirit of the sketch without worrying about getting all the details. Gesture drawings.

I have a tendacy to be very detail oriented so it was a bit of a challenge to be able to let go and just capture the basics and move on. I have much more to go

Technorati Tags: Journal, Sketch, Watercolor

Landscape as Architecture

This is a sketch I did outside of our office a few weeks ago just as the trees were turning. I have been thinking a lot about landscape as architecture. Landscapes can surround and protect and give a similar feeling of enclosure that buildings do. Most of us only think how pretty a good landscaped urban area is without thinking that someone took the time to think how people could interact with the space and get pleasure from interacting with it.

Most of us think that the natural world around us is that way because God had a hand in bringing everything together. Occasionally man may attain similar success but unfortunately people think it was always that way and discount the benefits of excellent landscape design in the built environment.

Technorati Tags: Journal, Sketch, Watercolor

I Am A Problem Solver

I am an architect and our firm is working on the restoration/seismic upgrade of the historic Mormon Tabernacle in Salt Lake City, Utah. A truly great and unique building.

I have written about it in the past and have made several sketches of it as it takes shape during the construction process. There is something about the construction process a building goes through that is so fascinating to me. Especially on a restoration/remodel type project you get to see many glimpses of how a building looks and appreciate the great skill and ability the craftsman has in putting it all together. I happen to really feed off of the constant problem discovery, research and resolution process that happens when the project hits a snag which is almost every day.

Resolving design problems is such an exhilaration and it is one of the most appreciative talents the Architect possesses when faced with new challenges. If the architect truly understands the building and construction process he is highly valued when new problems arise. Conversely, if the architect doesn't understand the construction process then he is quickly criticized and ineffective in carrying the project forward. Not all architects posses all of the talents to see through the project from inception to completion. Most find their niche. Some are design gurus that only live in the theoretical and are the ones most people are accustomed to seeing in glossy architectural journals and in the media. Some are highly technical and they end up either writing specifications or developing construction documents ("blueprints"). Others are very people oriented and they deal very well with the client and end up as project managers and principal owners of architectural firms. And then there are those who really understand the construction process and excel at putting the project together after the drawings are published- they end up administrating the construction process. I happen to do well on all levels- (my least favorite is putting together the construction documents). But I find in excelling in all areas leaves me relatively flat because I am not a specialist. In our society today we are constantly refining and creating new specialists who end up highly trained in one specific trait- the "widget". I am very fortunate that I am involved heavily from inception to completion- seeing a building project through this way is highly satisfying.

One of the most fascinating parts of my profession is that I can be involved at all levels and stages of the project and can expect to do such different things almost every day. When people ask what it is that I do I tell them I'm a problem solver. From solving the clients building needs at the beginning of a project, to resolving construction issues at the end of the project we are constantly looking at different ways to solve the issues of the built environment. Most people think I draft all day- which sometimes might be the case but not for the most part it is the least of my activities.

Unfortunately, I secretly desire to be a watercolor artist and this blog is my outlet. Drawing and creating art is a very similar process as in creating architecture. Some of it is very esoteric and theoretical, some is technical, some of it is just plain hard work. But going through the entire process and seeing the completed product creates such intense joy and satisfaction. I am convinced that no matter what it is whether it is art, craft, architecture, music composition or even gardening- the act of creating and seeing that creation through completion is a feeling like no other.

Technorati Tags: Journal, Sketch, Tabernacle, Watercolor