January 2019

In the Portland Art Museum Contemporary Native Arts wing, I sketched a furnace-sculpted glass bear by Dan Friday, called 'Lumi Lightning Bear.' I would love to see how he sculpts his bears. This especially appealed to me because it incorporated a woven motif.

I may have been thinking of fibers when I made these designs. The one on the left led to the one on the right. (Now my yarn is used for a drawing model instead of for knitting.)

 The Urban Sketchers of Portland rode the tram up to OHSU to sketch bridges, but the fog was so thick, the views kept appearing and then disappearing over and over  again. This is my view of the skybridge....


and the hillside of trees in the foreground of the fog covered city.

When there wasn't a good outside view, I drew some sketchers.

Here is an inside and an outside view from Behind the Museum Cafe...

and here is a corner of our livingroom and a peek into the darkness outside.

Finally, this is the begonia on the living room table (above).

September 2018: Portland

Back in Portland, a jet-lagged sketch in Montavilla with the Urban Sketchers of Portland.

A beautiful day sketching in a garden at Edgefield in Troutdale.

A view from the window of World Cup in NW Portland.

Novermber

Inside, looking out...

Outside....

Inside...

More October Sketches

Portland State Farmers Market

Giant Trees by the PSU Walk of Heroines

South Waterfront

Tanner Springs

Cormell Farms Pumpkins

NW Portland, view from Ken's Bakery

Sketching with the Urban Sketchers at Rocking Frog on a very rainy day.

Sketched the day before the election.

Saturday, the Urban Sketchers of Portland had the opportunity to sketch inside an old foundry. I sketched some of my fellow sketchers before tackling the huge press.

              

Library Sketches

Black and White or Color

Last week, I went to the waterfront with some sketcher friends and we drew the dragon boats.

I never got to the painting, so my boats do't show any of the vibrant colors that we saw. Of course, with watercolor, mine never would look bright. Someone thought it had the look of a woodblock.  I may try making a linocut  print. 

On Saturday, the Urban Sketchers of Portland went to the Sunnyside neighborhood and some of us sketched the people painting the sunflower in the street intersection. I tried ink and then found that it was easier for me to capture loose gestures using my magic mulit-colored pencil. 

Still, the colors were far from the magic of the colors of  life.

 

By afternoon, another sketcher and I sketched in the shade of the trees and structures of the Sunnyside Enviromental School. Most of the colors here were greens and browns and grays. When adding the watercolor, I realized  that my new Sailor calligraphy pen I had tried had water soluble ink, so any colors I used would be mixed with black. I decided to go for a limited palette.

On Sunday, I had a very short time for a downtown sketch, so I went for the minimalist approach. The car (one of my least favorite things to draw) came after I started and there was no way to work around it. Just as I packed up, the driver pulled away.

I love color, but I always feel more comfortable with black and white...and maybe an accent or two.