git er done

random dude from hunting magazine, pen, 10 min

Saturday Life Drawing 10/25/08

pen, 5 min

pen, 10 min

pen, 30 min

pen, 30 min

More life drawing. Thanks for coming by.

Saturday Life Drawing is Back

Dave, 5 min, colored pencil

Dave, 10 min, colored pencil

Dave, 45 min-ish, watercolor and ink

Thanks to Wes for getting the free Saturday life drawing sessions going again. There was a really good turnout. These drawings are pretty bad...this is the first life drawing session I've been to in over 2 years I think...maybe more. The model, Dave, was a great model, is regularly proportioned, and presumably doesn't get blown by methed out Republicans like the last one.

mAPPLE_THOR(N)pe

ink sketch from photo, 5 min

This is another one of those where I was headed to bed and thought to myself- "I need something to post tomorrow!" So I sat down and did this quick thumbnail from a Robert Mapplethorpe photo that I had in a book that was sitting around. I remember reading an interview with Patti Smith about a time that Mapplethorpe gave her her first hit of acid, and they walked around New York during this huge garbage strike and there was garbage piled up everywhere and she freaked out. Sounded pretty heinous. That story always makes me think of the time that I was in Texas with some friends, and we brewed a big pot of thornapple leaves, drank the tea and then proceeded to have unspeakably surreal hallucinations for 2 days. Precognition, retrocognition, psychokinesis. I had a fairly in depth conversation with an old friend that had died 2 years earlier. Wild. Tropane alkaloids are really like nothing else on Earth, and I think the proper attitude one should have towards them is fear. I think the only reason that the Patti Smith story brings the Texas thing to mind is that Mapplethorp kinda sounds like thornapple, and, well, a freakout is a freakout.

meeting minutes

John in tha Meeting, 2 minutes, pen

Naoyuki Tsuji

experimental animator Naoyuki Tsuji, pen and photoshizzle, 30 minutes

Meeting Minutes

Steve and Matt, Gel Pen, less than 1 minute

Brain Droppings

pen, 15 min.

A Fort Collins Jazz Experience

jazz fan, pen, 10 min.-ish

This is an old guy enjoying the music at the 1st annual 'A Fort Collins Jazz Experience.' It was drawn on the back of a festival satisfaction survey. Along with Tara, my long time partner in crime and good friend, I was a volunteer 'stage manager' of the Oak Street stage. I decided to sketch this while Tara was busy attracting the attention and conversation of every weird old guy in Northern Colorado. I believe we were more or less reppin' Arts Alive Fort Collins. Arts Alive is executive directeded by Rachel Herrera, who is an awesome painter and a totally cool chick. Speaking of painting, I think I'm going to go home and do some oil studies.

Don't Drink and Draw

no comment

Ugh. Awful. I did this one after a pitcher of margaritas at El Noa Noa and a few beers with friends. Don't drink and draw. I drew this around 1am. After finishing, I immediately stood up, realized I was too drunk to drive home, and crashed on my friend's couch. Then I got up at 5am to go to work. Blah. However, I do think it says something that I was able to keep my commitment to drawing every day AND posting a sketch instead of completely slouching it off to go get hammered with my friends. I'd rather post a crappy drawing than no drawing at all.

Book Store Girl

random girl in the bookstore, 5 min., pen.

I happen to live in the South Broadway artsy-trendy-indie district in Denver. While the scene can certainly be pretentious, I try to take advantage of the good things that it has to offer. Like the many cafe patios, where you can sit for hours and watch the cute indie girls in their skirts and print tees, and the hipster dudes who walk by in hot pink shoes and Big Business and No Age shirts, pretending they are hanging out at the Smell in L.A. (a couple of years ago...when it was cool...when I was there).

One of my favorite spots is the Denver Book Mall. It's not a normal used book store, but rather a co-op of over 20 book sellers all under one roof. They also have decent coffee and a small art gallery. Last night I was sitting in the magazine section flipping through a LIFE magazine from 1972 and decided to do a quick sketch of the girl across the room as she was staring out the window. As usual, I could only stand it for so long before I had nightmare hell ride images of turning into an urban hipster myself, like some kind of god damned latte werewolf.

As for the sketch...this is why you shouldn't let your drawing muscles atrophy for a year and a half. I remember a time when a life drawing of such low quality from my own hand would have triggered cascades of vomit. Oh well, that's the point of this whole "sketch a day" thing, PRACTICE!!! I have a feeling that, after drawing every day for a month, my skillz will be back up there somewhat. We shall see.

South Central Colorado @ 80 mph

When cruising south on U.S. 285, somewhere past Fairplay you are hit with the realization that you've escaped the Denver Doldrums and you are in the presence of the Real Colorado. A light rain had just tapered off, so we rolled down the windows and were immediately hit with the scent of Ponderosa Pine, Lodgepole Pine, moist Alder Fruit and Colorado Blue Spruce. Keeler and I both leaned back in our seats and filled our lungs. In this part of Colorado, every switchback reveals a unique and picturesque panorama. It can be a bit overwhelming; every 90 seconds or so your entire field of vision is filled with a new and amazing landscape. It's enough to temporarily wipe the cynical gunk off of your pineal body.



I decided to take advantage of the situation by attempting to capture some of the landscapes in my sketchbook. As you can see, sketching in the passenger seat of a car doing 70-80 mph over mountain switchbacks poses some unique challenges. Aside from the bumps and g-forces generated by this kind of driving, there is also the previously mentioned constant changing of scenery. I only had about a minute and a half to capture each image, so I decided to do a series of thumbnail drawings. A started somewhere past Johnson Village and continued as we approached Wolf Creek Pass. These are about 1" squares, more or less the same size as they appear on your monitor (unless you have the same screen resolution as my grandma).

Not the best drawings I've ever done, but I get credit for coming back from a road trip with sketches to post, right?

Thanks very much to Robin for the new moon Cleansing Ritual, and to Rollin for taking care of the Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms.

Currently listening to the Chemirani Trio:

Em sketch

I felt a little cheap after yesterday's post, so I thought I'd post something a little more authentic. This one is actually mine. The art and the subject.

I think I may try to turn this into a "sketch of the day" type of deal. I've started drawing every day again in order to get my chops back up for a new batch of paintings, so the obligation to post things would probably be a welcome pressure. Iyengar says "Pressure bursts pipes and also makes diamonds." Perhaps I will start after I get back from kicking the Animas River's ass this weekend.