Lunch with Pens and Markers

It might be the end of September, but the trees here still pretty much look like this: green green green.

Follow Friday: Adebanji Alade

Last night was the last of the Sketching with Oils classes I taught at Flicker Street Studio. What a great class that was! 

One of the artists I showed them (I love examples!) was Adebanji Alade, an avid sketcher and plein air painter living in London. Check out his work - it is really quite moving in its expressiveness and intimacy. His work and dedication are very inspiring!

Sketching with Oils

For the past three Thursdays, and again tonight, I've been teaching Sketching with Oils at Flicker Street Studio. The class is an introduction to painting with oils and an exploration of sketching with different materials. We learned the basics of mixing colors and of composition while "drawing" with paint. The students did a great job, as you can see below. Can't wait to see what they do tonight!

Happy Birthday!

Happy Birthday to my ever-patient husband, who will sit with me, or for me, while I sketch; who will sing me a song when I ask him to, or will make one up; and who makes me laugh every day. I love you!

Studio Night Last Night: Paint!

Beginning of Studio Night

A few minutes in

End of Studio Night

Corner of a painting that I finished!

Busy Friday Night

It doesn't matter that this quick, unfinished sketch was made a month ago - this could be any busy Friday night at Memphis Pizza Cafe! Always busy because it's always good.

Memphis Monday: Epic!

This is where I get my hair cut by miss Cyndi Jo Hartley. It's on that weird strip of Mendenhall right near Poplar where there are all of these little shops that have been there forever. And the new ones, like Gus's Fried Chicken, feel like they've been there forever. I'd like to sketch that whole strip some time.

Oh Errands

Studio Night Last Night: Paint and Piles

Studio Night last night consisted of paint, yarn, emails and dumplings.

Obligatory Airplane Sketch!

I forgot to post this from my trip to Maine last month. This sketch makes it look like I had a lot of room! Actually, I got two seats to myself and my legs are pretty short, so I guess I did have some space.

Memphis Monday: Cooper Young Festival!

Every year the Cooper Young neighborhood invites the rest of Memphis over for a party. It is a completely crazy event with people parking up to a mile away, getting drunk on the street in the daytime, eating funnel cakes and buying crazy looking folk art.

You have to go with the right attitude, that you will be hot and sweaty and it will be crowded and there will be a guy pulling a barbecue smoker on the back of a bicycle (not even to sell, just to eat later), and that all of that will be okay.

For the past few years my friend Heather and I have gone together, usually with her kids but this year without them, which she found very exciting. Every year she has to stop by the "crepe" place. I say "crepe" because while the thing the stuff goes in is a crepe, they do not offer ham and cheese, which just as we say around here, "ain't right." I tell you what, it sure does smell good, though.

We listened to singer/songwriter Mark Stuart.

Later, after pronto pups, twisted taters, lots of shopping, some much-needed rest on a friend's porch, lemonade and a funnel cake, we sat down on a curb in the shade to hear the band Motel Mirrors. In this sketch half of the people are facing one direction watching the band, and the other half are facing the other direction waiting for the ATM.

These two ladies brought chairs.

Last sketch of the day, listening to the band, maybe dancing a little while sketching.

Supply Sunday: Laloran Sketch Books

I've been using the Laloran sketchbook we got from the Symposium for about a few weeks and I'm really enjoying it. It's a great size (fits great in my purse!) and the paper is excellent - takes everything really well. See my test page, below!

Blue Day

Not the mood, just the color.

This was two days. I couldn't get enough of this blue.

New-to-Me Restaurant

A couple weeks ago I went to lunch at a place called City East Bagel and Grill and it was delicious. They have plate lunches, so I ordered turkey and dressing! Yum! And greens and something else that wasn't memorable.

As I sketched the pepper sauce that sits on the table of so many restaurants here I wondered, do people outside of the south use this? Or even know what it is? Does it have any uses other than to go on turnip greens or collard greens? Here's how I do it: I sprinkle this all over my greens, then eat a layer of greens, then sprinkle on some more, and so on and so on.

I was using Dr. Ph Martin's watercolor in a waterbrush for the red and noticed it was kind of leaking, so I grabbed a napkin to clean it up and it was just everywhere. Then on the napkin it looked like blood! I took that napkin and wrapped it inside of a cleaner one so that it wouldn't look like a terrible accident had occurred at my table.

There was so much food that the next day I had the leftovers for lunch. This time I was ready with a marker that was closer to the color of greens.

Studio Night Last Night: The Comfort of Paint

Last night I started two new paintings and I love them both.

As usual these are just a sneak peek. I can't show you the whole thing yet because they wouldn't make sense to you. But I'm relieved that they make sense to me!

Can't Not Sketch Umbrellas

Saturday, Saturday, Saturday, Saturday, Saturday

Saturday, Saturday, Saturday, Saturday night's all right.

Follow Friday: Beth Gilmore

Follow Beth Gilmore at Tales from the Little Pink House, where she posts her own work, which is simultaneously sweet and haunting, and posts interesting work by others.

Drawing at Work

What?! I don't draw at work, that's crazy.

Memphis Monday: Dixon Gallery and Gardens

This is the quickest of sketches from the Dixon Gallery and Gardens. They have a front porch, which I love, and I sat there waiting for my aunt, great-aunt and grandmother one afternoon.

Supply Sunday: Sketcing with Pencils in Museums (or, I Also Went to Nashville)

Did you know most museums ask you to sketch in pencil rather then pen? Luckily I did, so I brought my pencil case full of colored pencils with me when we drove up to Nashville last weekend to see Art Deco Automobiles at the Frist Center.

Though I thoroughly enjoyed sketching these, and was especially glad I had color to work with, these little sketches in no way do justice to these gorgeous objects. They are really, really lovely - just no other word for it.

Though I made this one look like an clumsy dragon, it was actually the most beautiful car there.

There were a couple of motorcycles, too.

Even the shadows created by the door handle were beautiful.

It was weird to sketch in pencil so much after using nothing but pens for the last year, but it was the perfect way to sketch these cars because I could just go over the shapes repeatedly, trying to get it right.

The colored pencils are Derwent Inktense, and the graphite pencils are Design Drawing 4B. These are in my Laloran sketchbook, so they are pretty small.

We ate that night at City House, which was a very good way to end a fun day.

(click images for more detail)