Sketchbook Exchange Update - Drawings #3 and #4!

So, it has been a busy summer...and a busy start to the school year! I am finally getting around to posting my next two sketchbook exchange entries. I have had the pleasure of drawing in 3 other fabulous artists' books, and I have the next one on my desk, waiting to be filled. 

DRAWING #3 - August 2014

To catch you up: I decided to do my third sketchbook entry on some of the gorgeous botanicals that I see when we go to Myrtle Beach, SC: the crepe myrtle tree and the magnolia tree.

I was very pleased to have been able to cover both of these in the spread, and I kept with my favorite media, ink or ink and colored pencil. 

On the upper left, you can see a close-up of the crepe myrtle (Lagerstroemia.) This is a close-up of the small, round buds that form before opening up into the frilly, tissue-paper-like blossoms. This particular tree had white blossoms, but we saw many with gorgeous, deep pink blossoms as well. Below the blossom is a sketch of the side and top views of the crepe myrtle seed pods. These dried brown pods contain six segments and look like little stars.

On the right side of the spread, I was able to include some drawings of the beautiful Magnolia grandiflorium that are so prevalent in the southern U.S. The upper right shows a cross-section of the immature magnolia seed pod. What a fun find! This has a soft, fluffy white outer covering with a velvety, dark brown stem. The lower right of the page shows the seed pod as it sits among the glossy, dark green leaves. I love the rusty brown underside of the magnolia leaves and tried my best to capture it with colored pencil. 

DRAWING #4 - September 2014

For my next drawing in the sketchbook that arrived in September, I had an easy choice of subject. Upon our return from Myrtle Beach in July, I made a happy discovery in our front flower bed: a pumpkin vine was growing! This was the most inadvertent, yet successful, gardening I have ever done. I had left a large pumpkin to decay in the flower bed last winter (too lazy to get a garbage bag to put it in...) After the hard winter we had, it emerged in the spring, frozen white and starting to decay. The local squirrels had a ball tearing it apart and must have put some seeds in a good spot, since we now have a lovely pumpkin plant there!

I loved seeing the bright, orange/yellow blossoms popping up. They also shrivel beautifully as they shrink, curling into wonderful shapes. Once I saw how the pumpkins begin forming under the shriveling blossom, I decided that would be a great way to show both the fruit (in a stage not typically seen) and blossom. I also included some sketches (in graphite) of the blossoms as they begin to form, with hairy stems and beautiful, structural ribbing. These are on the right-side of the spread.

This particular journal was a bit bigger than the others so I wanted to think of something to include on the opposite page of the spread. I love the large, lobed leaves of the pumpkin plant, especially since that is mostly what you see as it grows. They start out tiny and spread into a wonderful, large green canopy covering the blossoms and fruits. This particular leaf is life-size on the page, but in life would grow to nearly twice this size.

I initially started with a graphite drawing, but decided to switch to pen using a stippling technique that allows for delicate gradations of shading. Stippling is wonderfully meditative, but it does take some time. As I was a bit behind on my timing to finish the book, I left the leaf half-completed which works well since this is a sketchbook, after all, and not a finished piece.

Finally, I added the curling tendril at the top of the page, connecting the spread. These tendrils are found all over underneath the pumpkin leaf canopy, extending from blossoms to stems and wrapping around all of the parts of the plant. 

I am so excited that we are about halfway through the exchange now! I look forward to working on my next entry so stay tuned!

 

Sketchbook Exchange Update - Drawing #2!

The sketchbook exchange is off to a wonderful start! I posted about my own sketchbook a few weeks ago. After mailing mine out to the next artist, I waited for the one being sent to me from our fellow participant in Singapore.

It arrived and contained a stunning painting of the nutmeg, both the nut and the leaves, along with wonderful notes about the plant. Now I had to think of something to add to this beautiful book!

I decided to go with a study of a wild gladiolus that I happened to find in my front flower bed. I did not plant it myself, so my guess is that a squirrel or chipmunk may have transplanted it for me from elsewhere? Regardless, it was a beautiful find. I loved the curve of the stems, leaves and purple/pink blossoms. 
 
I started with some sketches on a separate sheet to get a sense of the plant and what I wanted to emphasize. I also took a lot of reference photos from every angle. 

Eventually, the plant left in the flower bed also produced gnarly little seed pods where the blossoms had been, so I was able to take one off and dissect it to include in the sketchbook. I decided to go with my favorite combination of media for the sketchbook - ink and colored pencil.

 

I added some notes about the plant as well as color swatches of the pencils I used to finish off the study.

I am looking forward to receiving the next sketchbook and have some ideas in mind from my recent vacation to South Carolina...some magnolia studies, slash pine cones, or perhaps crepe myrtle? Stay tuned!

GNSI Fourth Coast Illuminated Exhibit!

UPDATE: Check out the Fourth Coast Illuminated's Facebook page! It contains an online gallery of 72 (of the 75) images in the exhibit.

I am excited to be preparing three pieces for an upcoming exhibit called Fourth Coast Illuminated. This exhibit of art by GNSI artists from the Great Lakes region will feature flora, fauna, and archaeological artifacts of the area. 

The exhibit will be held in the Glen Vista Gallery of the Kalamazoo Nature Center from July 1 - August 30, 2014 . Kalamazoo Nature Center is one of the most highly regarded nature centers in the country and is considered a leader in the field.

I will be including three botanical works in the exhibit:

Spring Beauties - ink and colored pencil.

White Trillium Bud - ink and colored pencil.

Wildflower Leaf Survey - graphite pencil.

If you are local to the area or find yourself in Kalamazoo this summer, stop by and see the wonderful work that will be on display!

International Sketchbook Exchange!

It has been forever since I posted last! Happily, I have been busy with some different projects and finally have something to post about. 

I belong to two fantastic groups on Facebook for botanical artists: Botanical Art for Beginners and Botanical Artists. Both contain artists from all over the world who share a common interest in and passion for botanical art and illustration. 

Earlier this year, a subset of artists decided to start an international sketchbook exchange, inspired by a similar endeavor by other artists in the group last year. I was thrilled to be invited to participate! 

There are 9 of us total, spanning the globe from here in the U.S. to Ireland, Italy, the UK, Austria, Turkey, and Singapore. We all agreed to purchase the same type of sketchbook, Stillman and Birn's hardbound sketchbook from the Zeta series in A5 size (approx. 5.5 x 8.5 inches.) The Zeta series contains 180lb paper suitable for both wet and dry media, but most importantly, it opens up to lay flat, so one can work on a spread of two pages fairly easily.

Initially, we thought we would stick to just botanical subject matter, but agreed that if inspiration struck differently, we could feel free to include other natural subjects or artistic interpretations (e.g., some of the artists do motif work or other ethnic design work.) We also agreed that we would do a minimum of one, two-page spread and maximum of two, two-page spreads.

Each of us started our sketchbooks with some sort of decorated title page and then created some art to open the book. I decided to go ahead and cover my sketchbook with a nice Italian book cloth and pasted endpapers of a beautiful handmade paper from my favorite store, Hollander's. 

 

I started with a title page that included our group name, Nature Miscellany - A Sketchbook Exchange and space at the top for each artist to write their name. 

Since this is an international effort, I wanted to include something about where my book is coming from, so I drew an outline of the state of Michigan and added a couple of small botanicals: the state tree, the eastern white pine, and the state flower, the apple blossom.



 


I began working on the sketchbook during the frenzy of spring wildflower season, so I did a two-page spread of graphite sketches of the nodding trillium and bloodroot, two species that I had specifically hunted for in the woods this season. 
 

   
I saved the second two-page spread for a wildflower that I have wanted to draw for several years: the yellow trout-lily. The mottled leaves, resembling trout, and graceful, curving blossoms are a treat to find all over the forest floor in early spring.

I mailed my sketchbook out for our first round of exchange last week. We are mailing east, and I am excitedly awaiting the arrival of our Singapore artist's book soon!

Each of us will then have about a month to do a sketch in the book we received and mail it on in the exchange. It should take roughly a year to complete all the books, and we will have a wonderful treasure filled with beautiful artwork from artists around the world! 

Stay tuned for posts on my latest sketchbook entries!

Sketches and a new piece

Happy March! It's been a long, cold winter, to say the least! I know we are not quite done with it yet here in Michigan, but it helps to be starting a new month, that much closer to spring.

Although I have not done any great quantities of drawing or big projects this winter, I have been keeping my pencils warmed up with sketches here and there.

Below are some studies of a pretty little African violet that I picked up at the store a few weeks ago. The petals are a beautiful purple/violet color with frilled, white edges. I started with pencil sketches using my 4H pencil for a lighter touch:

Such graceful, curving stems! Then I moved on to a more detailed study in ink and colored pencil. I enjoyed rendering the overlapping petals and you can see the variety of blues and violets I chose to layer to get the correct color. The view from behind the flower (on the right) allowed the light to shine through the petals more, so the coloring was slightly brighter and lighter. All of the stems and buds are covered with tiny, fine hairs which I indicated in pen.

Finally, I have started to work on new piece, which I hope will be a finished one, probably in ink and colored pencil. This will be the Spring Beauty wildflower that I have sketched and photographed in detail before. I am trying to decide on composition, but definitely want to include the opened flowers as well as the clustered buds that hang gracefully off of the main stem. 

I actually like this simple composition below, but may want to include some overlapping elements as these tiny flowers intertwine and carpet the forest floor each spring. Stay tuned for more on this one!

Back to Drawing! Powder Puff Tree (Calliandra haematocephala)

Happy New Year, all!

We have had a bit of an extended winter/holiday break from school since the polar vortex arrived here in Michigan. However, things are starting to thaw out and we will be back on schedule soon.

One bonus of the extra time was having the opportunity to get back into drawing after the holidays. Right before our most recent snowstorm and cold snap, we had a chance to get up to our local botanical garden (Matthaei Botanical Gardens in Ann Arbor.) Lots of wonderful plants blooming in the conservatory and my husband was able to take a number of great photos. I was thinking "reference photos!" for my files. Although not ideal, working from photos is still an opportunity to study a plant and practice rendering techniques, especially after a lull in creative activity during the holidays.

One of the things we saw really caught my eye, the Powder Puff Tree (Calliandra haematocephala.) It has beautiful, fluffy, bright red/pink blossoms and gorgeous buds right before they bloom. A challenging subject, but one I was really intrigued to figure out. All of those filamentous bits on the flower!!

So, I broke out the colored pencils and worked on a study of a blossom. I use Faber-Castell Polychromos pencils and chose a piece of 5 x 7 inch, 140 lb Fabriano Artistico Extra White, hot press watercolor paper. It has a nice weight and takes many layers of pencil well.

I started by using Payne's Grey to sketch out the flower bud and dark ends of the filaments.

This gave me a bit of confidence by mapping out where I was headed with all of the individual "fluff" of the blossom. Some botanical art friends suggested using different shades of red, so I did just that. I began with Deep Scarlet Red, following the shape of the filaments.

I continued layering with Middle Cadmium Red, Dark Red, and Madder, adding some brighter Geranium Lake at the end. 

I was careful to leave some white space (shading in light pink) that occurs at the base of the flower where the bloom first opens up.





 


I finished up shading the unopened blossom and branch by adding in some May Green and Olive Green Yellowish. Here is the finished study:

I think it turned out rather well for an intimidating subject! As one of my artist friends stated, it is a great start! I would love to do additional studies of the buds, leaves and branches and put them together into a more finished piece. 

What projects have you started on or would you like to begin in this new year?