VP Location: Nova Scotia

Another quick last-minute sketch for the Virtual Paintout: Nova Scotia, Canada. A street view of the smoke stacks of a power plant outside Halifax...like a trio of coral snakes standing unnaturally in stiff vigilance. Reference link here.

Crosswalk-Abbey Rd. London

Another sketched painting for The Virtual Paintout: London. In this view, the white building behind the trees on the left is 3 Abbey Road NW8-home of Apple Records and Abbey Rd. Studio: drawn in the fortieth year after that famous crossing. (BBC video story of the crosswalk today.)
Reference link here.

Barcelona: Scenic Vintage Monorail Ride...and a Miracle

This is a painted, 'street view' sketch of a vintage monorail ride at a turn-of-the-20th century amusement park on top of Tibidabo Mountain overlooking Barcelona, Spain. I did this drawing as a submission to an on-going project called The Virtual Paintout: a monthly artistic challenge in which participants are given a city to explore and paint using the incredibly cool street view feature of Google Maps.
After much searching and wandering, I honed in on this amusement park with its atypical structures and interesting views. With an artist's eye I circled, looking high and low and back and forth, for a suitable angle from which to base my composition. Little did I know that-through these actions-I was to be the recipient of a random glimpse of auspicious coincidence, revealed to me in the most capricious manner: a million to one chance discovery of a bonafide Christian 'miracle', more obvious than twelve pizza Jesuses, IMHO and with all due respect.

Click on my drawing and you will 'see' what I am referring to:
the figure of Christ descending from the heavens!

Grant you, I have drawn this figure in the sky myself; but those that know me will tell you that I am not prone to chicanery or religious make-believe. When I do a drawing from a photograph, I usually go to great lengths to portray the scene with a modicum of accuracy-at least as much as my skill level will allow.
So...here is the Google Maps image in which this 'miracle' has manifested itself and upon which my rendering is based:

If you would like to see this in Google Maps for yourself, the address is 48 Cami de Vallvidrera al Tibidabo, Barcelona, Espana. In the boundless realm of possibility, there is this one street, one spot, and one direction where this phenomenon exhibits itself and even though I suspect that any miracle begins and ends on this side of the boundless veil...what can I say: I was impressed.
Long live serendipity.

Everyday Matters Challenge #83: Draw a Nearby Body of Water-A Pond

This is a beautiful, intown neighborhood duck pond near a project I am currently working on in an area of town called Buckhead. I did the pencil sketch drawing half 'plein air' while waiting to meet with some clients/friends who want a couple of porches built on their house. I drove around for the best vantage point and with pad over steering wheel, I drew what I could in one hour.
I am starting to see the limitations of my beloved Tombow markers and may have to branch out and learn to use true watercolors...maybe. I am also grateful that the work in the renovation business-for me anyway-keeps coming in.

Everyday Matters Challenge #193: Draw a Close-up Part of Something (the inside of a TV)

Several months ago, my wife and I were sitting in the kitchen getting ready for dinner. It was raining pretty hard. A bolt of lightning hit something right outside our house. The bowl of peanuts I was so calmly eating flew into the air as I involuntarily catapulted out of my chair.
After we got over the shock (and relief that our house wasn't on fire), we assessed the actual damage. Among the casualties was this small TV.

I took the back of it off hoping to see something obvious to fix, but there was nothing. After it sat around for awhile, I got intrigued by all the spots of color and form, so...I pulled one last picture from this dead TV before it was taken to the recycling center.

Everyday Matters Challenge #85: The Inside of a Store in Your Area

This is a favorite haunt. I managed to find one of the few remaining chairs. As the figures started to go down on the page, I felt like I recognized the guy on the left.
Sure enough, if you go back into my blog to EDM #133: Draw a Peach...I swear it's the same kid standing in line on the left.

EDM Challenge #9: Organized Chaos

This is my tool bag that I use to renovate houses, some of the contents of which change weekly. Its main function is to be a 'catch-all' for the tools, etc. that invariably 'float' around the shop and the job-site(s). I don't generally carry this around...and most of the time, it stays in my truck.

I decided to include the scan of the drawing before I colored it because, well, I liked it in its black and white state, too (and once it gets color, there is no going back!). In the finished, colored version, I used Tombow markers, Pitt pen (S, #175), graphite pencil-for the preliminary sketch, and some watercolor pencils (because I like the red better, for instance.)

EDM #165: The Front of My House

This is the front of my house from the one-lane street I live on. As you might be able to tell, it sits slightly down from the street. My wife and I designed and built it back in 2000, a life experience and result for which I am grateful on a daily basis.

I used Tombow markers, graphite pencils, and some watercolor pencils. I tried to use my trusty Pitt pens, but they wouldn't work because of the nature of the paper (architectural tissue paper) and the color pencil build-up. I think the disconcerting lack of dimension in the foliage is due to this. In hindsight, I would have done all the ink work and shadowing first, but I was experimenting with laying down colors first (after a pencil sketch). Two interesting things I learned tho' were 1) the Tombow 'blender' pen also blends the watercolor pencil marks, and 2) by using drawing tissue paper I was able to color some things (like the roof) on the backside of the paper. By doing this, the lines on the front side remained unclouded.

So...anyway, I am thinking that I might back off on the more concentrated pieces and try to just 'draw' a few of the EDM challenges without alot of complexity...and possibly more frequently. There are plenty of people whose work I admire doing exactly that...with great personal success.

EDM Challenge #141: Something with Bristles

It has been awhile since last I posted...continuing with the color exploration.
In Georgia, pine trees are ubiquitous; so, to draw pine bristles with a couple of pine cones amidst them is to capture the everyday of this part of the world.

EDM Challenge #153: Something in a Plastic Bag

Mark this day...something new is afoot: color...my first blog drawing in color. (...entering Oz.)

EDM #110: Something with flames

I remember very vividly when this exhibition hall burned-in 1976. Back before I really knew anything about Buckminster Fuller, I was genuinely impressed by this geodesic structure when I walked through it during Expo '67 in Montreal. So later, when I saw the footage of this archetypal form on fire, I was mesmerized. (What a visual!)
Just the other day, I happened to be looking through an old publication from the seventies when I came across this news photo from that time. Through the act of freehand drawing it from that historical photograph, I was mesmerized again...such is the power of art.
(Apologies to fellow EDM'rs: this is not really an 'everyday' fire!)

EDM #148: Soothing

There is something very soothing about anticipating and then walking out to the end of a very long wooden pier, into the heart of a vast marsh with absolutely no one around...the sound of sea-birds and waves crashing onto a wild, sandy beach way off to the east. This is one such pier I traversed while visiting the beautiful coastal islands of South Carolina-during the cold Christmas holiday.

This drawing is very similar to another one I did several months ago. An unintentional series seems to be developing.