Drawing, the key to making all of your art better.

dragon sketch ink on paper

The more I draw, the better all of my art tends to get. Spend too much time painting and neglect the drawing and I can see the quality wane. So, more drawing! Happy Valentine’s Day!

Cat, ink on paper

My heroes have always been Cowgirls

More Western art. Oil on canvas panel, 11×14″

Mary, Mother of God

This is a painting I finished around Thanksgiving, for my Mom’s Christmas Cards. Today is Ash Wednesday, wishing everyone a Blessed Lenten Season.  Oil on Paper, 11 x 14″.

“If you ever feel distressed during your day, call upon our Lady, just say this simple prayer: ‘Mary, Mother of Jesus, please be a mother to me now.’ I must admit, this prayer has never failed me.”
– Blessed Mother Teresa

Thanks for following!

I now have 68 followers, which is amazing! Thanks for the comments too, they are very helpful. Here is a bonus painting, recently completed this commission- do you know this building?  Acrylic on canvas, 16 x 20″.

 

simple.. just a bird

It’s June! The sun is up early and so are the birds 🙂 Oil on canvas, 5×5″

Improving Drawing and Finishing

Instructing at a drawing workshop this week.

I get this question a lot, “what is the best way to improve my drawing?” There is only one answer– “Draw.” Most of what you draw in the beginning is not very memorable, take these first drawings and put them away for a year. Keep drawing, then compare your new drawings to the old ones, there will be a remarkable difference. A great teacher told me “we all have 1,000 bad drawings in us, once you draw the 1000th, they are gone for good”  The rest of the advice:

push and pull

lighter lights, darker darks

draw, draw, and then draw some more

Lastly, spend some time on your drawing, it will show in the end. Over a couple of days, about 2.5 hours on this drawing. It sounds like a lot, but the time goes so quickly you may not notice!

“Bubble” Pencil on charcoal paper, 11×14″

Been at it all week…

So a long hiatus, but I have a good excuse..err.. reason. I started to teach a couple of classes and there is nothing like that to give your skill set a workout! Since they are drawing and painting, I will post a couple of each. Here is a starter, thanks and welcome to the new followers and thanks again to my old friends 🙂

 

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back to the easel

After teaching kids how to draw and paint this summer, I am back in the studio. I demo’d how to draw Spidey about 100 times! I got them started by teaching them how to draw everything from “Hockey” (she meant Hawkeye),  Rapunzel, and my favorite, the Flying Uni-Panda (this is a thing now) . I learned Snoopy had a girlfriend (!!) named Fifi and  drew her a few times. As they head back to school this week, my young artists have learned a lot and even got to use “REAL artist” materials. Here are my two finished paintings from my first week back at “my real job”.

Morning of the Third Day, oil, 10 x 20″

Webcrawler, acrylic,  12x 24″

Weekly Painting Week 100- the simple things

Back to basics- figure drawing with charcoal. One piece of paper, one stick of charcoal, one eraser, a cloth. I had a discussion with a fellow artist, he said good drawing was not necessary for good painting. I am on the other side– work on drawing, make better paintings. Draw, draw, draw. Thanks for following all the way to week 100- whew! 18 x 24- “Athena”