People of Starbucks

Continuing on what will likely be a short lived drawing tour of DC (due to the absurd heat. I am NOT leaving this house...) I hung out with Daphne at a Starbucks and did some drawing. People at Starbucks look so bored. Why so sad coffee person?

Who knew there were such interesting architectual elements to a Starbucks...

The following are paintings from Tuesday. These are based off photographs by Lan Nguyen (used with her permission.) Just some quick watercolors, testing some ideas.

And here are the originals! The tea kettle and cups stood out in particular to me. Plus there is just some fun framing going on with the edges.

I'm a sucker for the macro shots where one thing is in focus and everything else is blurry. This visual obviously played out much better as a photo than a watercolor. Thanks again to Lan for letting me use some of her photos, I may do so again in the future. 

Party Party Paint Paint

I binged on painting today. I think I painted for about 5 hours? All I know is that after 3 hours Hulu was basically like "Hey maybe you should take a god damn break and stop watching tv." Don't tell me what to do Hulu.

I finished 2 of the paintings I started last week. And please take my short survey about the blog!

I'm fairly happy with this although I don't think I captured the emotion nearly as well as I did in my earlier sketches. I may revisit it later but for now, I'm calling this one done.

As for the 2nd painting I'm quite happy with how it turned out. The paint is still wet so I don't think this image captures the colors very well. I couldn't get a good photo without all the wet paint shining back too much.

Here's some details from the painting. Enjoy!

Red Ribbon

Since I posted the drawing of my grandfather I've had over 150 views on the site! Thanks for checking everything out. I must have burned a lot of creative energy though, nothing interesting particularly lately, but here's a few sketches and an idea I'm working on for a potential painting.

Pencil sketches

Figure sketches with conte. There's the conte stick actually ^^^

Black & White conte and charcoal

All in the Family

Today's drawing is the best I've done by far since I started this project blog.

In what ended up being an early Father's Day gift (because I'm too impatient to wait another week) I gave my dad a framed drawing of HIS father. My grandfather was a baker in the army during World War II. My grandmother had a photo of him in his uniform from 1946, which I photographed while I was visiting about a month ago and used to construct this drawing.

My dad loved it and I'm happy he did. It also got me thinking about my family's creative history. My grandfather was a painter, but sadly he was not able to paint as often as he would like, because as an immigrant to the US, he had a hard life caring for his family. But I know it would mean a lot to him and DOES mean a lot to my dad that I paint now, even though I never had the opportunity to see him do so.

My dad jokes that I definitely didn't get my creativity from him, but my dad actually did some photography when he was younger, and was better at it than he realizes. My dad's sister is a fashion designer and my uncle did graphic design for decades.

On my mom's side, my sister has an amazing visual sense and does incredible videos. My brother is a musician and was in a band for about 10 years (they were big in Amsterdam I'm told!). My niece is a dancer and DRAMA QUEEN!

So that's a little of my family history. Please leave feedback on this one, I would love to know what you all think as this one means the most to me out of everything I've done so far this year.

Charcoal and black conte crayon on bristol board

Art school confidential

I've been watching movies and shows while I draw just sort of for background noise, and today I was watching Art School Confidential. If you haven't seen it, skip it, it's not very good. BUT it does ring true that the main character is struggling to find his way, can't find inspiration (except for being in love with this girl for no reason ever explained except that she's pretty), and in general doesn't understand how other artists are succeeding. He also runs into a bunch of douchey artsy stereotypes that I also dealt with in college, but that's another story.

That was the case for me today. Nothing has stuck so there are a lot of random things. It's frustrating that after a month, no clear idea has stood out or started to evolve for me, although my most successful thing to day was revisiting the images of the recent storms in the Midwest. So here you go art lovers! Lots of random, not that great drawings. But I promised myself I would draw every day regardless of artist's block.

Definitely the most successful thing of the day. Revisiting the images of the tornado damage last month.

I was watching the Alice in Wonderland movie and just thought the costumes were really beautiful.

Also the result of watching Alice in Wonderland. 

This isn't meant to be a particular person, just a sketch.

Ready for my close up! I always enjoy drawing eyes.

Narcissism

Ah that other famed subject of artists, the self. Helen suggested I do a self portrait and it also proved to be a good warm up for my other drawing today. I won't be revealing that one yet though.

This turned out okay. I realized too late that drawing on the drafting table throws off my point of view, so in particular the eyes are too high on my face. This is why warm ups are important though! Pretty sure the 2nd drawing turned out much better as a result.

Back to the drawing board

Hooray! Returning to making art today and clearly trying to make up for the last few days of missed creativity.
I also have my new drafting table set up! Bought it off of a friend who is moving and needed to get rid of stuff. Best. Purchase. Ever.

Today's inspiration was my trip to Costa Rica back in March. Some of the amazing things I saw.

One small detail.

I have another drawing I completed but it is a sketch for a more detailed drawing I want to do as a gift for someone. So not gonna show it for now.

Michelangelo painted manly women

Unfortunately I don't have a model at my every beck and call, so these are loosely based on some famous paintings in history. At least one of is probably identifiable to you as a Michelangelo, but I can't be held accountable for her massive guns. Mikey painted his women that way!

1000 points if you can identify either the artists or paintings the others are based on. 

Detail shot of the above

 Messed up the face on this one, but still pretty happy with the figure. Sorry lady!

Red bridges and Blue doors

First, thanks to everyone who have been checking out the project. I appreciate the support. I would love feedback! You can either post a comment OR under each post there are "Critique" boxes that you can check to let me know your opinion. 

Finally time to venture into using mediums besides pencils! The nice thing about watercolor is it's easy to do lots of quick studies and if it doesn't turn out well it's not a big deal. So here's 2 I considered successful today.

The first is the door of a church in Hartford, CT. The bright blue doors struck me as unusual.

 

The second one. Well based on the title of this post, I'm sure you can guess. 

 

Lastly, I finished the drawing I began on the train home the other day. I'm actually pretty happy with the results for such a rough pencil drawing. 2B is not my best medium, so this turned out well!

Sketching on a train is not ideal

Inspiration on an Amtrak train can be difficult so I ripped this page from a magazine I had.

And this is pretty much the result. Unfinished but the tracks have become too rough. Hoping to finish it in the coming days.

Side note: the tracks between Boston and NYC are very smooth. Between NYC and DC not so much.
Side note 2: In Delaware on Amtrak. No sign of VP Biden.

Spring sculpture

Earlier this spring I took a sculpture class at the Torpedo Arts Center in Alexandria, VA. This was one of my main projects which I stupidly forgot to pick up once it was dry! Oh well.
The sculpture was based on a live model who posed for several sessions.

The second sculpture was actually from the first part of the class. I wasn't too happy with the results so I had fun throwing it in the garbage/accidentally beheading it.

Bushnell Park

The Corning Fountain in Bushnell Park - Hartford, CT. Oh the sacrifices we make for art. My pants are quite wet now from sitting on the rain soaked park bench.