One Rock Leads To Another

As I’m prone to do these days, I was sitting around, listening to a podcast when a pen leaped into my hand and drew a rock.  I thought, that’s ok, but it needs a friend.  So I drew another rock.  Pretty soon I had a pile of rocks so I put a bit of sand in front of the pile, a bit of ocean and sky behind it, and I had a landscape…well, sort of.  In truth the rocks don’t go together as well as they would if I were drawing them on location but l’m ignoring that and sharing it with you.

I’m still walking, and still doing 2-min sketches.  I’m finding that while these are sloppy and unsatisfying, they have gone a long way to remove the “couped up” feeling that isolation was causing me.  Now I go out almost anticipating those couple minutes where I put pen to paper.  How are you adjusting to your new situation?  Any tricks?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

6 thoughts on “One Rock Leads To Another

  1. For some reason I like drawing piles of rocks … usually rip rap at the ocean, or a talus slope with pika. Yours are very good.
    As for coping with our new life style: It is the first time I’ve been ‘home’ during spring for several years. I don’t remember seeing oaks in full bloom, what a baby fir cone looks like, and we’ve been watching an osprey nest. They’ll be egg laying soon. There is lots to see close to home when we look.

    • Me too. There’s something meditative about drawing rocks, particularly on location.

      Sounds like you’ve got lots around you that inspires. It’s still pretty cold here. Our snow has mostly melted but it’s still barely breaking the freezing mark these days so everything is still brown and without growth of any kind. In another month things will liven up around here. Thanks for dropping in, Elva.

  2. Don’t those 2 minutes feel great? I sketched from the traffic circle again today, and it felt so good I nearly passed out. 😉 Seriously, I’ll never take such simple sketch opportunities for granted again. We had no idea what a luxury it was to pull up a stool and sketch for an hour with mobs of people walking by.

    • Ain’t it the truth, Tina. I have yet to do one that I like to look at and these 2-min sketches give me none of the meditative feelings I get from my ‘real’ sketching, but oh, how they liberate the soul. Yesterday I studied a scene, took a photo, skipped home, cropped the image to my liking, eliminated a tree, and the spent a couple hours drawing/painting it. What a glorious good time.

  3. Dang Larry, I love your sketches. I think those rocks are lovely.
    Early in my art/sketching journey I wanted to be an urban sketcher until I realized that I’d have to leave my home. Not very appealing for a die-hard, unapologetic homebody. So I settled into being a happy-like-pappy domestic sketcher of everyday things.

    Needless to say, “stay home except for essentials and emergencies” had been my daily mantra for several years. So, I’m good.

    Nevertheless, I am acutely aware of the cloud of uncertainty and confusion that hangs over us and it has been affecting me somewhat, all positive.

    (1) I haven’t been posting my favourite Facebook groups (Instagram remains my favourite place to hangout though) but my daily sketching practice continues unabated but I am sketching more mindfully, more intuitively and with an special kind of gratitude for the ordinary everyday things that never quite made their way into my sketchbooks before.

    (2) I’m reading more art books and blogs and experimenting with my art supplies.

    (3) I am watching more videos by my favourite YouTube sketchers, esp. Barbarba Luel, whose style is so meditative and soothing. Her daily Create Corona Sketchbook videos have become my evening ritual.

    • >Dang Larry, I love your sketches. I think those rocks are lovely.

      Aw shucks [head down, kicking at the dirt] Thanks, Cheryl.

      >Early in my art/sketching journey I wanted to be an urban sketcher until I realized that I’d have to leave my home. Not very appealing for a die-hard, unapologetic homebody. So I settled into being a happy-like-pappy domestic sketcher of everyday things.

      Hee, hee. I’ve been exactly the opposite. Until I started having mobility problems, I would never draw at home. I had nothing against it, I just couldn’t motivate myself to do it. Had to be sitting on a stool with people walking by 🙂 I suspect we’re both the worse for our biases, but we all walk a road, mostly of our own making.

      >Needless to say, “stay home except for essentials and emergencies” had been my daily mantra for several years. So, I’m good.

      I was mostly recovered from my arthritis problems and looking forward to spring, location sketching, so this mess came as a blow to my psyche. It took me a couple weeks to get over the combination of stress and disappointment but daily walks and my 2-min sketches have brought me back to form.

      >Nevertheless, I am acutely aware of the cloud of uncertainty and confusion that hangs over us and it has been affecting me somewhat, all positive.

      I’m baffled by what I’ve seen in American response to this pandemic. I fear that the largely ignorant minority have taken control of the country. Here in Canada nobody considers the pandemic a political issue. Imagine that. Instead, every day, the Prime Minister gives a 30-40 min brief/questions where he talks about what the federal government is doing and a dose of empathy and encouragement. Each of the provincial leaders do the same, only with details on what’s going on in the province. I think Canadians are much more calm about it all because of it. When I see people talking about “fascist Fauci” and suggesting that Bill Gates caused the pandemic, I have to believe that Americans have lost their minds. I don’t envy you.

      >2) I’m reading more art books and blogs and experimenting with my art supplies.

      During the year I could hardly hold a pen, I read lots of art books and it really knocked me off my urban-sketching only perch. I realized how much I’d limited myself with that singular approach.

      As the Brits say, “Keep Calm and Carry On”. Sketch a little too 🙂

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