A few sketches of December…a leisurely walk by the Loire, some faces in a bar and a shed in a friends garden.
…a shed in a friend’s garden…
.. sketchbook 15,3×25 cm, watercolor and pen…
…bare tree at the loire…
..sketchbook 15,3×25 cm, watercolor and pen..
…faces in a bar…
..sketchbook 15.3 x25cm, watercolor and rotring pen..
Work is still continuing here at Coin Perdu. I made a sketch of my future kitchen window from the outside in. It will be one of my most favorite places in our mountain home, that is for sure. From the inside it has the most stunning view and I can already imagine the inspiration on my cooking!
On a late afternoon, while the fire was crackling for our dinner, I stood at a little table with watercolor, black Indian ink and a charcoal stick and just scribbled down an apple tree down below. The paper was far too small for such an exercise but it was the only ones I have here. I’d like to do this again, but with large pieces of paper. the exercise was good though, bringing a bit of freedom to a stiff wrist.
The bottom sketch (to the right, apple tree 2) is upside down. I put down the tree trunk in ink with a big brush, left it to dry, took off to see to the salad and when I came back, the wind took it from the table. I picked it up and watercolored int he foliage, only to realize after a while I did it upside down. Well, it still served the purpose, not needing to be good art.
All sketches done in Indian ink with Japanese brushes, watercolor and charcoal sticks on CP watercolor paper, 29,7x42cm (11 3/4″x16 1/2″)
I’ve started my garden at Coin Perdu. We are still working on the house, so I am limited to where I can garden for the moment. A rock garden close by the barn we’re living in for the moment works good. It also serves as a little lay in garden where plants can with for their permanent place in the garden. It was hard work, since it is a little grass covered hill that I had to dig out, remove the grass, lay down big bolders, fill with rocks, treat the soil, add compost and all necessary, leave it to settle and then plant some plants. It still needs work, but for now it is filled with plants loving sun and rocky corners and it has steps that lead up to a little corner on the hill where a bench waits patiently for someone to sit and admire my handiwork…? It is adjacent to the old pigsty, that will soon become my laundry room and the bench will be a welcome repose from all the washing that needs attention on a farm!
The top sketch is of bags with compost and soil and stuff(I don’ t have my own yet!) and some plants from the pepinier(I don’t have my own hothouse yet!). the second sketch is the rock garden, just competed this morning.
Two sketches from a sketchercise walk by the Loire, where I do my usual thing…sketch with a pencil or pen in watercolor sketchbook and adding a wash at home.
A waterpump in the tiny knotted garden by the Maison de la loire .
The narrow tree lined pathway by the Loire.
And lastly a sketch of my “chicken” in the garden.
All sketches with pen/pencil in watercolor sketchbook
Today is earth day. Some garden sketches as my contribution.
All sketches done in moleskine with rotring pen and watercolour.
…tulips…
*Create a garden that is ecologically friendly. Ban pesticides. Plant combinations of plants and herbs and certain weeds for natural pest control. Learn to live with a few weeds and some chewed up leaves. Promote insect life by planting flowers that atttract them – lavenders, feverfews, buddleias, lilas, roses, honeysuckle… Take care of birds with available waterbaths, nesting houses, perches… Keep containers all around the garden to catch the rainwater with which you can water plants. Create a “strong” garden by not over watering your plants, much like you would train a young tree to bend with the wind, thus forcing it to grow strong. Use the water you rince your salads or other foods in the kitchen with, to water your potplants. Plant herbs to use in your cooking, for medicine, for the household. Ban chemicals from the kitchen and visit Gramma for tips on natural household products. There are info and tips all over internet and books galore on how to live as close as ecologically friendly as we can today, without going to extremes and freaking out on “bio”. Just a little effort already helps a lot.
Respect our earth, care for it and enjoy it.
Water on “earth day” – a clear brook, is my contribution to Watermarks. Drop by to see all our contributions for this day!
…a resting place for animals..
…a resting place for humans
…camelia…
I’m still frantically struggling artwise. It may not seem so, but I am.
I’ve spent some ample time sketching and drawing, doing contour work, splashing paint and it still feels as if I’m slopping through mud. I suppose I am in the low part of the creative cycle and will need patience and perseverance to rise again. Patience doesn’t come easy for me, especially when I have a new book of artists in hand and see what amazing talent and excitement and original creativity are happening in the art world! Then I “intensely dislike” the slushing here in my mud pool!
…a little colour in mud…
Watercolour on Fabriano artistico paper HP, 30x23cm (11,8″x9″)
A while back Lindsay posted some of her comments which I found a great idea; sometimes there is such valuable info and support in the comments which we miss out on. I’m going to follow her lead and post some comments of my previous post. From these comments it is clear how many/all artists relate to these feelings of frustration, understand the creative struggle and recognize their own share of lows with personal experience and bits of advice here and there. These are the things I learn from on my daily creative journey…
…..”the nice thing about things forgotten is that they come back again quickly, and one has the chance to change a thing or two about them”… said Gesah.
…”Sometimes when work shows a little struggle in the birthing it only makes it more pleasurable to see. I learned that from a painting I did that when I looked at it I could only see the struggle. A viewer told me they loved it BECAUSE they could see the struggle which gave it much more drama and excitement than the ordinary pretty picture it might have been without the struggle”…said Jana.
…”sometimes those ‘tough love’ approaches do us the most favours…” said Cathy
…”like anything else you have to warm up first. If I’ve not been on my bike for 2 months, I am shaky and breathless just going down the road – but after a couple of rides, I’m back in the saddle. The same with drawing for me – if I’ve not drawn for a while, I do the most clumsy, embarassing drawings until I get my eye back in again”… said Carole
…”sometimes our brains get in the way of our making”…said Maureen
…”I really learn when an artist shares the process she has gone through. We can all sympathize with those times when the creative juices seem frozen”…said Annie
…”I have a tutor who echoes in my head in the same way :>) when going through a bad patch on the degree and being very nervous of him (he was very acid and didn’t suffer fools gladly) I was was overworking the paint. Each time he walked by he said ‘put it down (the paint) and leave it ALONE’, ’round the class …. back to me …. and he’d say it again and again! It worked”…said Vivien
…As far as I can tell, for a certain type of artist (of which I am one and I think you are, too), it’s always a process of learning, losing the way for a time, relearning, picking up new materials, re- finding old ones, circling back to old themes and concerns, recalibrating, rethinking, refocusing. It’s a lifetime thing. Or so I think. I try to be accepting of the process, as dispiriting as it sometimes seems”…said Laura
…Art doesn’t come out in an even stream, but we go backward and forward and through all kinds of loops and spins”…said Bill Fulton
…I guess those things work like when you have a bad hair day – YOU see it very well in the mirror, but everybody else thinks you just look like you always do”…said Nina.
…”Sometimes what seem to be harsh words sink deeper and do good even if they can feel soul destroying when they are spoken”…said Jeanette
…”I can empathize with what you said. I know when I have not painted or drawn for an extended period of time, there’s a little reluctant anticipation….kind of like the sensation of jumping into cold water…but once in…. it feels good”…said D Prizzi.
…”But painting, like riding a bike, will again come naturally”…said Desirée.
(a recent comment)…”these things definitely do come and go in cycles, don’t they? One of the things that is always hard for me to remember is that the cycle moves more quickly if I still show up and work every day. (There’s a good book about this that I should probably re-read — “The War of Art” by Stephen Pressfield.)”…said Turningturning
Africantapestry 
