Here are a few thoughts about drawing with pencils. First, have you noticed that when galleries tell the medium used in making a piece of art, they say things like “oil”, “watercolor”, “acrylic”, or “pencil”? “Pencil”???? Isn’t that actually graphite? In a sense, calling a pencil drawing “pencil” is somewhat like calling a painting “brush”.
Never mind.
When the customers retrieved their pencil drawing with all those little bitty faces, they wanted to know how in the world I was able to make those tiny visages legible.
The way I got those tiny faces was with little itty bitty adjustments while working under a magnifying glass using these tools, working for many hours on nothing but those faces, refining with each pass, turning the photos and the drawing upside down in order to evaluate the shapes, the darkness, the blurry quality, and then mimic what I saw.
That teensy eraser came into being about 5 years ago. (Okay, if it feels like 5, it was probably 8 or 10 years ago.) How were we able to draw without such a tool?? There were other eraser sticks, but none so tiny. We relied on erasing shields to isolate small spaces, which were never small enough. Now, with the Tombow Mono Zero, we sometimes want an even smaller eraser.
Those sharpeners by Blackwing are designed to give a long point, using 2 different blades. First, use the hole on the left for a looonnnng lead (not actually lead—Pb—but graphite). The hole on the right makes an extremely sharp point, unless the blades have worn themselves dull, which mine have. I had to break out my new one, which I had been holding back on using because it cost $14!! For a pencil sharpener??
Since I no longer have one in reserve, it seemed prudent to buy another backup. Now they are $16 on Amazon. SIXTEEN DOLLARS FOR A PENCIL SHARPENER!
Sometimes it feels good to just sketch quickly, without anything other than a Blackwing pencil I usually keep with me, using any available blank piece of paper. It is a different kind of challenge, which is probably good practice.
Yeppers. Time to raise my prices.
P.S. SIXTEEN DOLLARS FOR A PENCIL SHARPENER?? I’m struggling with this concept, which you may have noticed.
For the first time in many years, I kept track of how long this took. Getting these little people to be themselves took a very very long time. (Don’t ask—not telling). It is probably (past) time to raise my prices.
This may be the most difficult pencil drawing commission I’ve ever accepted. I’m getting it done anyway.
I showed you this yesterday. To prevent (or at least to mitigate) smearing, I work from top to bottom, left to right. Left-handers can go from right to left. (All of us need to remember to lay a piece of paper over the drawing rather than rest our hands on it while working on it.)
Each time I work on it, I revisit the faces to see if it is possible to get a closer likeness. This isn’t required by the customers, who understand that would be asking the impossible, particularly in the second section.
Not sure how to tie the various parts of the drawing together, so I left gaps for awhile. Then I started fiddling around trying to mesh one segment with the next.
I added some sky so the snow on the mountains shows up better.
Two ideas that have come as I labor through this: (1) The dudes on Tunnel Rock are slightly larger and moved over (from the photo) so they fit better with the segment above. (2) There was a gap beneath the sequoia tree, which I could have filled with a yucca as the photo showed; a better idea was to put Charlie’s bass drum with the name of the band. (Jazzberry Jam is the old name.)
… I am working on several art projects at once. That is, IF I am actually working.
The little beach paintings are still progressing. I have enough boards for twelve of these. Six are now completed, three more are in the messy first layer stages, and three more are waiting for my decision to either paint more beach scenes, or paint some oranges.
I like these little boards.
Pacific Ocean IV, 5×7”, oil on gessobord*, $75
There are also three unfinished oil paintings in the painting workshop, but none have deadlines. The beach paintings don’t have deadlines either, but their small size gives me the illusion of productivity and progress.
Meanwhile, I have two very complicated pencil commissions to complete. One is now in progress; the other is awaiting my thumbnail sketches for the customer to choose from.
“Bad things happen quickly; good things take a long time. This is why patience and determination are such primary virtues.”
I don’t know who said this, but I intend for these two difficult pencil commissions to be good, so they may take a long time.
*Gessobord is something akin to masonite, coated very smoothly with gesso, a thick white paint, probably acrylic.
Whenever I have a show, no matter how many pieces sell, I bring home the rest and wonder why they didn’t sell. Then I think about the ones I’ve had the longest, pieces that I have improved on each time I show them again. How can I make these pieces better?
I did this scene as an 8×10 to test it out. It was the beginning of my phase of painting orange groves with hills and snow-covered mountains, which coincided with my beginning forays into plein air painting. This type of scene embodies the best parts of Tulare County—rural, citrus, foothills, snowy Sierra.
Tulare County’s Best, 8×10″
It was fun, but of the quality that caused my dearest and closest (and most honest) folks to ask if I was finished with it. So, I touched it up again, and it Is better. But it still hasn’t sold.
Tulare County’s Best, 8×10″
In spite of this little painting’s lack of success, I still love this scene. I painted it again, this time 24×24″. (Sometimes I actually do paint what I love instead of just what I think might sell.)
Tulare County’s Best II, 24×24″, NFS*
Now we’re cooking with gas! Brighter colors this time, because as I develop my skills and “voice” as a painter, I gain more freedom to exaggerate and embellish (but within reason, because I am still a leading citizen of Realville).
Three shows in good galleries (well, come on, I know this is Tulare County, so they are non-profit galleries rather than big city pushy money-hungry galleries) and it hasn’t found a home.
Think, think, think, AHA!
First, let’s try a little better living with technology, and tiptoe into the AHA. Using Photoshop Junior, I combined Tulare County’s Best II with a detail from a more recent painting of the same genre.
What do you think now? (almost said, “How do you like them apples?”)
Yeppers, Tulare County’s Best will get even better.
*NFS means Not For Sale, because it isn’t finished yet.
On December 19, the power went off at 7:20. Edison hadn’t bothered to notify us, but judging by the number of boom and utility trucks, we knew it would be a long, cold, dark day. (SO VERY THANKFUL FOR THE WOODSTOVE, THE GENERATOR, AND THE HUSBAND WHO KEEPS IT ALL RUNNING!)
There was a bit of sunshine on the easels for about 2 hours in the morning. With the door open, I was able to make some eensy progress. Since my reference photos for both of these paintings are on my laptop, I needed to be prudent with my screen time. (We don’t run the generator non-stop, and it keeps the fridge and freezer going, which is very far from the painting workshop).
I should be able to paint this without looking at any photos. If the instructions suggestions weren’t to reproduce a specific pencil drawing, I could make up a similar scene. However, in the hopes that the interested party will be happy enough to buy the painting, it is prudent to keep it as close to the drawing as possible.
Tucker stuck with me, not even in the sunshine, just doing the meatloaf to stay warm.
This one is the commission. I want it to be really really good. Really Good. The customer is a delight to work with and not pressuring me at all. I just want to do my best for her.
It helps to see the shapes and proportions more correctly if I turn it all upside down.
I am working from a combination of two photos and the sold painting that the customer wished she had seen first.
SIMPLY HOME ENDS ON SUNDAY, DECEMBER 29, AT CACHE, 125 SO. B STREET, EXETER, NOON-4.
ENTERING GIANT FOREST, 8×16″, $250
2025 CALENDARS, STILL AVAILABLE? (LAST TIME I CHECKED, THERE WERE TWO. )
Still not much going on in my little world, other than enjoying some bright sunshine and starting two bright paintings. Winter is mild in Three Rivers and we are usually above the fog. (Do you want to move here? The town is shrinking, so if you don’t mind living in California’s flyover country where there is no Trader Joe’s or universities, you’d be welcome here!)
From my show Simply Home, I got a commission to paint. In spite of having 50 paintings to choose from in the show, someone requested that I paint something that already sold. Yes, I can do this.
Someone else requested that I paint a scene that I drew in pencil about 25 years ago. It was a commission, until I realized that it wasn’t a commission—it was a conversation. Until money changes hands, it is just a conversation, EVEN IF the other person says, “Yes, I definitely want you to paint this”. Because it is a great idea, I know it will sell to someone, so I began the painting.
