Last weekend I spent four days in Maine volunteering to “get out the vote.” During the days I was there, the weather took a colder turn and the leaves changed quickly. The oak trees changed from gold to orange to rust to brown during those four days:
Maine’s hills and lakes are beautiful in the fall.
My Mom died ten years ago this month. For the last several years of her life, she was in a wheelchair. Here’s a pencil sketch I did of her as she talked on the phone to one of her many friends.
At last the foliage is at peak here in New England. Our neighborhood is blessed with some sugar maples, and yesterday I parked my car in front of them at the beginning of our street and spent half an hour making a sketch. This is one reason we love living in New England!
Our older granddaughter Lila will be 13 on Thursday. Years ago, when she was learning to read, I bought Lila the early reader Bob books. Seeing her curled up in her striped pajamas was too delicious not to photograph and paint. She is still a redhead and an avid reader.
A reminder of family and friends who died too young.
This week is the second anniversary of the death of my dear cousin Connie, who was 71.
Did you know that in the year 1900, the average person died at 49?
We are blessed to be alive, in this moment, right now.
This weekend Bruce and I have been in Brooklyn to help our son Andrew with six-month-old Maggie while he works, and our daughter-in-law Eva travels to California for a family wedding. While Maggie napped I went to a nearby coffee shop. What I loved drawing most about this scene was the traffic light and the one way sign.
And what a privilege to be with this adorable baby!
Several years ago we made traveled to Utah, rented an RV, and toured the major national parks for ten days. Arches is huge and studded with rock formations like this. The Three Gossips is iconic. You can see why.
How to compose a drawing or painting, even of a single subject like this, is a question. Should you put it right in the middle? Should you show the entire object, or crop it? Having the object off-center or cropping it often makes a more interesting composition. Here I painted the grapefruit off-center, then took a photo and cropped it. What do you think?
Here are two quick sketches I did the week before Labor Day at Sandy Island, the YMCA Family Camp on Lake Winnipesaukee, NH where we have gone for over 30 summers. The first is the water taxi for people to get on and off the island. The second is of the dining hall porch. Sandy Island is a great place to vacation! Check it out here.
It would be even funnier if it weren’t true ….
Once you choose a subject, from what angle should you draw it? That was the decision I faced with these Vermont flowers. Here’s the view I painted of one bouquet looking down from above, and thus showing the totality of the flowers.
You may remember this painting of a different bouquet, which I posted in early September, from a more traditional angle. Which do you prefer?
Yesterday was unseasonably warm, so Bruce and I went out on the Charles River in our kayaks, which our neighbors the Haywoods are kind enough to let us leave in their yard. The colors of the trees lining the river are getting subdued, and golds and oranges are beginning to creep in. I blame any uneven lines on the rocking of the kayak. And who needs a cup of water when the river is right there? If you look closely, you can see the two birds and the wood duck box on the left, and of course the kayaker on the right.
This week I’ll be posting a few more summer memories. Here’s a view of Lake Winnipesaukee, N.H., from a hammock on Sandy Island.
And if you live in the Boston area, you’re invited next Friday, 9/28 to an Art Night. I’ll be talking about “Everyday Sketching to Enrich Your Life,” and my paintings will be for show and sale. Catie Curtis is a fabulous singer! Here are the details:
When my friend Brenda and I went on a painting date recently, she suggested we try to sketch the Allen House, a historic site in Newton, MA near where we live, which was once a station on the Underground Railroad. We sat in the front yard of the house for an hour, me cursing repeatedly over the problems of perspective. Later at home, with a photo to jog my memory, I painted the sketch. This is a Moleskine watercolor sketchbook which folds out into a double landscape format.
Since Labor Day I’ve only posted one painting a week, but I’m resolving now to get back to twice a week, which go out Monday and Friday at 5 p.m.
The white pines of New England are such majestic trees. This one in our yard in easily 80 feet tall.
I love sketchbooks which are “Landscape Mode,” like this Moleskine Watercolor 5″ x 8 3/4″. (A tall sketchbook is called “Portrait Mode.”) They give you the option to turn them on their side to draw something tall and thin, or do a long view, as you will see with next Friday’s sketch.
Our long-time friend and neighbor Bill Saunders died unexpectedly on Wednesday from an accidental fall. May peace come to his spirit, and to his wonderful family.
This gorgeous bouquet, grown at a nearby organic farm, was for sale at the Miller’s Thumb in Greensboro, VT where we have a family cottage. But flowers, like summer, fade, so it felt right to make a more permanent image on watercolor paper.
The newly expanded waterfront at the YMCA’s Sandy Island Family Camp on Lake Winnipesaukee, NH, has both areas of sand for kids with shovels and sunbathers, and areas of grass with Adirondack chairs for readers (and sketchers).
Sandy Island Camp is a family camp run by the YMCA on Lake Winnipesaukee, NH. If you’re looking for a place for a family vacation, its wonderful! We are here for the week before Labor Day for the 33rd year in a row. Here’s a quick sketch of the waterfront.
New Englanders are divided between those who head to the ocean on vacation — Cape Cod or the coasts of New Hampshire or Maine — and those who prefer the inland hills and lakes of Vermont, New Hampshire, Maine or the Berkshires. We are in the latter category. We are spending the last two weeks of summer in Vermont and New Hampshire, and these late summer days are a good time to paint.
Avocados are, in my opinion, nature’s perfect food. So when my friend Justin and I tried out the new Mexican restaurant in West Newton Square last week, I couldn’t wait to order guacamole. It took a great deal of restraint to do the drawing before eating, and the bowl was nearly empty before I got out my paintbrush.
The Charles River is studded with water lilies at this time of year.
Here’s another view of the shoreline while rocking gently in a kayak, dipping my brush into the river.
Back at home, the weather has been hot and steamy. But if the evening is cool enough, you can take a kayak and go out on the Charles River.
Dipping my brush into the river as I floated along put a different spin on the term watercolor.
Bruce and I have become evangelists for train travel. We all say we want to see America. But you see very little on a plane. And in a car you’re mostly stuck on interstates, driving with all its hassles, eating one fast food meal after another. Whereas on a train, you can go to sleep in the plains of Montana and wake up in the Rockies. Or go to sleep crossing the deserts of the southwest, wake up to farmland in Missouri, and cross the Mississippi River during lunch in the dining car. It’s a trip of a lifetime.
The last stop on our trip was a final night in Chicago before flying home to Boston. It was a gorgeous evening to walk through Millennium Park, where Obama made his acceptance speech in 2008. The Cloud Gate Sculpture, also known as “The Bean,” is an startling stainless steel sculpture in the middle of the park. Designed by Anish Kapoor and completed in 2006, it gives the appearance of liquid mercury. Visitors take photos of the reflections of themselves, the crowd around them and the skyline of Chicago.
Some of my sketches take only minutes to make, but this took hours. It was a labor of love for this amazing sculpture.
The Southwest Chief is the Amtrak train which took us from Los Angeles to Chicago on the last leg of our train trip. We were on the train for two days and nights, and sat in the observation car watching the deserts of the southwest and then the lush farmland of the Midwest roll by. Here are two little sketches. First the tree which to many represents Southern California.
Then a view from the train window of the desert in New Mexico.
I am working on a painting of my favorite place in Chicago to post on Monday.
After we disembarked from our train to Los Angeles, we spent two days in L.A. and saw a bit of the city. It was fun to drive around neighborhoods, but Hollywood was disappointingly gritty and honky took. My favorite place was the La Brea Tar Pits.
In 1903, while drilling for oil, fossils were discovered in these tar pits in what is now central Los Angeles. Fossils of 35 wooly mammoths, as well as saber-toothed tigers and other extinct species have been so far discovered in the ongoing excavation. Here’s a painting of the full-sized models in the tar pit which you see as you enter (I have omitted the skyscrapers you now see in the background). Animals were lured by the water which turned out to be mixed with quicksand-like tar, and they got trapped, as the male is here. In 12,000 B.C., when the last ice age ended and humans crossed to Siberian land bridge to North America and started hunting them, these species became extinct.
I’m taking a break from making sketches of our train trip. Here’s a saying that really makes sense, doesn’t it?
We are home now, and I am painting from my photos. Our Amtrak train from Seattle to Los Angeles, the Coast Starlight, went inland for awhile, and then turned toward the ocean.
I’ve lived most of my life near the Atlantic Ocean, and by comparison the Pacific seems more majestic, colder and more forbidding. But we did pass some beaches where people were sunbathing and surfing. I used a white pen to indicate the edges of the surf.
We are at home now and have become evangelists for seeing the country by train; you can relax and see America out the window while avoiding driving, interstates and the same chain restaurants. I still have some paintings I want to create (from my photos) and share with you over the next couple of weeks. I will post them in the order we traveled: the train from Seattle to Los Angeles, a couple of scenes from L.A., and finally our train trip from L.A. to Chicago across the heartland of America.
The Coast Starlight is the Amtrak train which took us from Seattle to Los Angeles. It travels for a couple of hours through the Salinas Valley, where agriculture bring in $9 billion each year. Strawberries, lettuce, tomatoes, and spinach are the dominant crops in the valley, as well as broccoli, cauliflower, wine grapes, artichokes, and celery. Due to the intensity of local agriculture, the area has earned itself the nickname “America’s Salad Bowl.”
When I first started painting 20 years ago, I preferred to paint slowly and take hours to create a finished painting. Now I get a kick out of doing quick sketches, and especially get a high when there is time pressure. This sketch of the Seattle waterfront was done while we were waiting for our order at the Sound View Cafe in Pike’s Place Market. The orange cranes and crates in the background are loading container ships. 
The design of small living spaces — mobile homes, RV’s — is a real art. Bedrooms on Amtrak are cozy and have a couch, chair, closet and storage spaces, sink, toilet and even a little shower. At night they convert to upper and lower beds. They are quite comfortable, the food in the dining car is good, and the views from the observation car are often spectacular. Here are sketches facing each side.
En route from Chicago to Seattle on Amtrak’s Empire Builder, we passed through Glacier National Park. In mid-July, you can still see snow on the peaks. The observation car gave us great views including this one.
Sitting by a train window hour after hour watching the endless expanse of plains and farmland of Wisconsin, Minnesota, North Dakota and Montana, helps you appreciate the immensity of this country. Thinking about how you would feel if you lived there, so different in terms of lifestyle, worldview and even politics than living on the urban and suburban East Coast.
Our first destination on our Amtrak tour of the U.S. was Chicago. We went on the Architecture River Cruise, which is terrific. Chicago is rightly proud of the distinctive architecture of its skyscrapers which line the three branches of the Chicago River. In the last decade the river has become so clean that kayakers paddle nimbly among the big tour boats.
I’m so grateful to modern medicine and my double knee replacement two years ago which, after nine years of limited activity, are allowing me to indulge my travel bug. Bruce and I are just starting a 12-day train trip around the United States, something we’ve wanted to do for a long time. We’ll be taking overnight sleeper trains from Boston > Chicago, Chicago > Seattle, Seattle > Los Angeles, and Los Angeles > Chicago, spending six nights in the train and two nights in each city before returning home. I look forward to sketching and sharing with you.
In the middle of the Boston Common is a large shallow pond which is a kids’ wading pool in the summer and a skating rink in the winter. Last weekend, in the sweltering heat, it was full of little kids, and here is an impression I did of it. Sketching people just requires some little marks — the mind of the viewer fills in the rest.
In over 600 cities last weekend people marched to protest harsh treatment of immigrants and separating children from their parents in different detention centers. In Boston, despite sweltering heat, thousands turned out. I finally found a shady tree in the Boston Common to apply paint to my sketch.
One sign quoted Matthew 25:40 “Whatsoever you do to the least of these you do unto me.” Did you know (see map here) that there are juvenile detention centers in Connecticut and New York, and adult detention centers in Boston and all over New England?
As every advertiser, decorator and designer knows, we have emotional responses to colors.
If you are interested, here are the basics. The color wheel is made up of three primary colors — red, yellow and blue — and three secondary colors — orange (red + yellow), purple (red + blue) and green (blue + yellow). Yellow, red and orange are the “warm colors,” reminding us of fire. Blue (ice), green and purple are the “cool colors.”
Using contiguous colors together (green trees + blue lake and sky) produces a peaceful feeling. Combining opposite colors (blue/orange, red/green, yellow/purple) creates a vibration of excitement. A woman in an extroverted mood might accent her green blouse with a red scarf. When she was feeling quieter, she might dress in neutrals (gray, black, brown) or contiguous colors.
The last two paintings which I posted, “Clementines” and “View of New York City,” used the blue/orange combination to produce interest.
This is a view from the “Top of the Rock”, Rockefeller Center. Looking north toward Central Park, this unfinished skyscraper caught my attention.
Our daughter Kate, son-in-law David and 12-year-old granddaughter Lila joined us in New York last week to meet baby Maggie and enjoy the sights. What a city!
I’m working on a view of New York City for Monday’s post, so in the meantime here’s a painting from awhile ago of one of my favorite fruits. With gratitude to our dear late friend Ned Schofield for his photo that inspired the painting.
Tomorrow is my birthday. When I took my first watercolor class at age 49, never having done any art before that, I never dreamt of all the blessings it would bring, including making paintings and sketches to share with you.
You can learn a lot by copying. Here’s my attempt to copy a street scene originally painted by Shari Blaukopf, a fabulous artist and art teacher from Montreal. You can see Shari’s work and subscribe to her blog at https://shariblaukopf.com.
Not until we looked twice down this Greenwich Village street did we realize we had an unexpected view of the Empire State Building.
Making informal sketches of these complex city scenes is daunting. My attempt at a sketch of Grand Central Station was so frustrating it ended up in the trash bin. I painted this from a photo I took on location. The only way to handle the scene was by simplifying and editing out a lot of detail, and I’m still not very happy with it.
Our two granddaughters met yesterday when our daughter Kate and her husband and daughter joined us in Brooklyn. Here is a photo of 12-year-old Lila meeting two-month-old Maggie for the first time!
And here is a drawing of a cafe.
On Wednesday my friend Tracey gave me a tour of Brooklyn Botanical Garden. What a beautiful place! The roses are in full bloom, the cherry blossoms have gone by, the Japanese garden is a peaceful place to escape the rush of the city. I especially loved the Shakespeare garden, which has over 60 plants and flowers mentioned in Shakespeare’s plays. Here’s a sketch of some of them.
Bruce and I took the subway to Greenwich Village yesterday and spent a couple of hours walking around, sitting on benches and in cafes. I did these sketches on a bench in front of a Portuguese coffee seller and in a playground. The figures are pretty rough, but they had no interest in standing still while I sketched them! After drawing on location, the paint was applied in a cafe and on the return subway ride. A fun way to really tune in to you’re seeing!
Bruce and I have driven to Brooklyn to spend the month of June helping our son Andrew and daughter-in-law Eva with our granddaughter, seven-week-old Maggie. We are so excited to spend time with this adorable baby, and to be in New York in June!
Since this is meant to be an art blog, rather than granddaughter adoration, I will add a painting I did a couple of years ago of another child at the beach.
What I love about watercolor is the very thing that drives some people nuts: the difficulty of controlling it once wet paint touches wet paper. It’s much easier to control in the areas where the paper was dry. Often paintings are a combination of both. See if you can pick out the parts of this painting where wet paint touched wet paper, and the parts where dry paper left clean edges.
In Cleveland before my Oberlin College Reunion this weekend, a bunch of us went to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. I wasn’t expecting much, but it was really fun. A comprehensive look at the roots and branches of rock, lots of great music and videos, not to mention costumes, guitars and gift shop souvenirs. Here’s what it looks from the front, with 3-D letters that kids had fun climbing on. Worth a visit!
I am on my way to my college reunion at Oberlin College in Ohio. A number of us spent a couple of days at a pre-reunion in nearby Cleveland. Yesterday some of us visited the Botanical Gardens, which are wonderful. I did this sketch (which gave me a workout on creating different shades of green) while sitting in the cloudforest greenhouse. Every afternoon they release more butterflies into the greenhouse. How many butterflies can you count in this sketch?
