Day 496 – 🇫🇷🇫🇷 The French remember🇫🇷🇫🇷

November 18, 2015Leave a comment

The Canadian D Day cemetery at Bény Sur Mer. It seems appropriate to post it today with the fighting in Paris. War again in France. Our guides grandfather was a French resistance fighter killed by the SS when he was caught.

Today I heard a silly journalist on CNN say Parisians were not used to fighting in their streets. If you asked our guide she would tell you they still remember WW2. Bullet holes from WW2 still pock mark the buildings. The church at Ranville was full of bullet holes and huge chunks of it were missing from WW2 fighting.

🇫🇷 The French remember with three museums to the D Day invasions. This is the Canadian museum at Juno Beach were 5000 Canadians died.

🇫🇷 There’s one at the American invasions site and one at Pegasus Bridges were British paratroopers had to seize a bridge BEFORE the D Day invasion.

🇫🇷Our guide’s grandmother found bodies of 132 Canadian POWs who were murdered and buried in a mass grave in her yard. They still find WW2 bodies routinely in Normandy. So yes they remember!!

Stay tuned for more Frenxh sketches. There are at least 33 of them. 😳

Thanks for reading.

Margaret xxx

Day 496 – 🇫🇷🇫🇷 The French remember🇫🇷🇫🇷

November 18, 2015Leave a comment

🇫🇷 The French remember with three museums to the D Day invasions. This is the Canadian museum at Juno Beach were 5000 Canadians died.

🇫🇷 There’s one at the American invasions site and one at Pegasus Bridges were British paratroopers had to seize a bridge BEFORE the D Day invasion.

🇫🇷Our guide’s grandmother found bodies of 132 Canadian POWs who were murdered and buried in a mass grave in her yard. They still find WW2 bodies routinely in Normandy. So yes they remember!!

Day482 Paris

November 5, 2015November 3, 2015Leave a comment

We should be touching down any minute in Paris. Can’t wait to get sketching in France. To stand in the haunts of some of my favorite painters Monet Degas Matisse Van Gogh and Cezanne will be amazing. To visit the Rouen cathedral that Monet painted how many times?! Got to paint it at least once.

In the meantime going to post some of my Inktober sketches that I painted with the palettes I am taking with me.

This one lit up my Instagram feed. And yes I did strip my kitchen floor. Evidently it also striped my fingernails even though I wore gloves but hey my floor looks brand new!!

A quick brush pen sketch of one of the audience members at Best of Augusta. I just loved her look and couldn’t resist sketching her. Sometimes I find the audience members much more entertaining to draw than the bands that are playing. Her skin is burnt sienna with ultramarine blue for shadows. The hair is ultramarine blue and burnt umber.

My dog Honey was painted with the Whiskey Painter palette only two colors. Ultramarine blue and burnt umber. Period.

Thanks for reading. Pass me a croissant please!!

Margaret xxx

Day 480 – one day till

November 3, 20152 Comments

Lift off. My suitcase is packed and I have plenty of room for art supplies. When I went to key west I actually needed more sketchbooks. Not this time!!

So why am I taking to sketch with?!! I know u r dying to know!!!

My two small palettes. Been painting with them and they really have all the colors you need. The whiskey painters palette has all the basic Winsor Newton colors plus Daniel Smith Quin coral which I love for skin tones and two ceruleans because I use it A lot!!

The cotman is full of quinacridones and a couple of paints that should be in the Whiskey painters palette the yellow and Thalo blue.
Paint brushes. Taking the good ones since I have room and just in case. Most of them are Isabey sables including the mops but the big sable is my cheap Joes legend which I love. Curious to see how much the Isabeys cost in France the land of their birth. They are made in Brittany and are Charles Reid’s favorite brush. I wouldn’t mind another one or two.

Back up colors in case I run they the ones in the palettes.

Pens loaded mostly with Platinum Carbon Black. Top to bottom Kuretake Brush Pen, Black pitt pen Fine, pentrl brush pen, sepia pitt pen Fine, two Noodler Konrads (one has Deartementis document brown ink in it) Platinum Carbon pen, and two of my favorite pens the Noodler Creaper ahab.

I am taking these with me in case I want to paint as I sketch. I usually paint when I get home because I hate to make my sister Jan wait while I paint. Bad enough that she waits while I sketch.

Lots of ink and cartridges.

Lots of paper. The two hand made sketchbooks have Cheap Joes Kilimanjaro, 3 strathmore mixed media sketchbooks(my current fav) a tablet of Fabriano squarely 149# cold press, some Canson post cards and some Strathmore 500 watercolor cards oh and a stack of accordion folded Stonehenge paper to draw strings of people and maybe a chicken or two on?!

Thanks for reading.

Margaret who is taking clothes I her suitcase and backpack too!!

Day 478 – finishing up

November 1, 2015November 3, 2015Leave a comment

WIP??? Mermaid Lorelei and Mermaid McKenzie 11×14 super Aquabee tablet

Not sure these are done but at least they have some color now. Getting into travel mode so I used my travel Palette with Winsor Newton colors and my cotman palette with quinacridones.

The background in this painting is cerulean and yellow ochre. I may darken with ultramarine or inathradone to make the mermaids pop.

Remember this is what it looked like?

WIP – Mistress Princess Augusta – 11×14 drawn when I was done with one of the long mermaid poses. Her right arm still has problems. She was not posed so she was moving a lot and I drew her right arm too long. I shortened it with negative painting but now I think it is a smidge too narrow.
TIP: Really love her skirt. Both of these paintings were done wet on wet after watching a how to impressionistic watercolor video on Marcon Chews website http://www.marvinchew.com/ (You will have to scroll down for the video. Could not copy the exact irk for u! 😐) about wet on wet painting.The skirt turned out especially well I think. Done with ultramarine and burnt umber added to a wash of water that I painted on the skirt first. The background was done the same way.

I added the bowler hat to the original sketch.

Thanks for reading.

Margaret xxx

Day 477 – last of Dr Sketchys

October 31, 2015November 3, 2015Leave a comment

Happy Halloween!!

The first three are all drawn with my Noodler Konrad and Lexinton Grey ink. The colors are all Winsor Newton watercolor markers a few tombows and Wink of Stella Glitter pens.

Mermaid Lorelei and Mermaid McKenzie. What librarians do when they are not working!! Wear mermaid costumes and makeup like a character from Avatar.

My two favorite mermaid sketches. Thier costumes were awesome which is why I saved them for Halloween. This was a twenty minute pose that had ten minutes added to it.

I was done in twenty minutes so i started sketching Princess Augusta our hostess.

Mermaid Lorelei and Mermaid McKenzie

Twenty minute sketch. If I ever sit down to watercolor these this one will be great. I barely had time to start painting.

This was a ten minute sketch. I spent most of the time on the tail. Much more fun coloring than the human part. I really like the tail part but the human part not so much.

Mermaid Lorelei

Looking at that part of would be an easy fix. Shave a tad off the right side of her face and draw in her right upper arm. Oops the things u miss when unate drawing fast. The last one with the Kuretake brush pen. Sometimes I just draw better with one than the other. I changed to my Noodler Konrad.

Day 464 the last Best of Augusta #4

October 18, 2015Leave a comment

Another favorite of Bill Karp. Bytw he’s playing at the Cotton Patch in downtown Augusta this Saturday nite.

I really like Bill’s stance in these. Especially the first one.

Hand is a little rough but otherwise I like it. My excuse??

It was 9 pm and I was tired and on a sugar high from all the sweets at Best of Augusta.
Oh what was my favorite food?? T’s out on Mike Padgett Hwy. They kept the hot hush puppies and fried catfish and tartar sauce flowing. And it was perfectly cooked. Everyone else had chicken chicken and more chicken.

The last sketch I did of Bill. Not a perfect hand but I like it.

We left loaded up with cake, cookies and Krispy Kreme donuts. All those sweet treats still sitting on the kitchen counter.

Thanks for reading.

Margaret xxx

Day 463 more Best of Augusta #3

October 17, 2015October 15, 2015Leave a comment

Once i switched to the Pentel brush pen life improved. Or maybe it was Bill Karp singing Frank Sinatra?! His 100th birthday. Frank’s not Bills!!!
This is my favorite sketch of Bill. A good stance. Shoes look good and a good hand. Score!!

I kept trying to draw Bills hand. He waved them around a lot. I. Perpetual motion.

Finally a good hand though I made him a little fat. Oops sorry Bill!!

Thanks for reading.

Margaret xxx

Day 459 – Inktober more white dog

October 12, 2015October 12, 20152 Comments

Zoe curled up next to me on the sofa watching Super Soul Sunday.

Pentel brush pen Superaquabee tablet and some smearing of ink. She was mostly in shadows.

A week of RUNNING!! Off I go. Hope I finish my Diebenkorn today. 😋

Thanks for reading.

Margaret xxx

Day 458 – Zoe

October 11, 20152 Comments

Zoe Pentel brush pen in Superaquabee tablet

It’s not easy to draw an all white FLUFFY Jack Russel with black ink. Her fur is very wispy with a Mohawk down her back and bushy eyebrows. Impossible to draw those bushy white eyebrows with black ink. Zoe is a broken coat which means she has long hair AND short hair. An extra challenge.

Then there is her muzzle with black nose and lips and white hair with dots and a greyish cast. 😜 another inky challenge!!
So I started shading which was done by smearing ink with my fingers before it dried completely. The ink is permanent so if you wait to long it won’t move on most paper.

A redraw with my other non waterproof Pentel brush pens could be fun but we are off to the Magnolia cemetery ghost walk one of the most haunted spots in Augusta GA and the Hispanic festival. Hoping for lots of opportunities for sketching and photos for paintings!! And NO rain.

Thanks for reading.

Margaret xxx