The eyes have it

Okay, this is a test, all you bird lovers out there

Who can correctly identify the type of bird by eye alone?

 Each week, I'll reveal one complete portrait.  

The completed series will be shown and for sale this summer at the Santa Fe Art Show presented by the Morgan Oakes Gallery.

 My first show! I'm stoked.

Taxidermy Bear @ Wildcare, San Rafael

Immature Raven

Sketching with John Muir Laws can be inspiring! Here, therefore, the raven. Ravens can be distinguished from crows by their heavier, more curved bills. Eye color is light blue in hatchlings, grey in fledglings. Feathers of immature ravens have a duller, dark brown coloring.

Sketchbook Project 2013: Memoir

My Sketchbook Project 2013 is in the mail, on its way to the Arthouse Coop in Brooklyn. A show of all the sketchbooks submitted this year will be touring the country this year with a stop in San Francisco July 26 - 28th. My sketchbook was inspired by American choreographer, Twyla Tharp and her book, The Creative Habit. 

"The real secret of creativity is to go back and remember . . . connecting what we're experiencing now with what we've experienced before."

See my archived sketchbooks from 2011 and 2012 (and thousands of others from around the world) at www.sketchbookproject.com/library

Lakeside Garden Center

The sound of the waterfall is a tranquil accompaniment to sketch-making.  

UC Botanical Garden, Berkeley

Back in the saddle . . . it’s been awhile since my last post. Do you ever find that the poorer the quality of the paper, the less inhibited you feel to play with the image, the materials and just have fun?

Creeping toward abstraction

Using Inktense watercolor pencils in combination with watercolors.  What a blast! Pumped up my color intensity a notch. Now I learn that Inktense aren't lightfast.  Curses! Do I care that my originals will fade and lose their vibrancy?  Yes .  .  .  and no.