Lamberton Conservatory

we had a meetup this weekend at the Lamberton Conservartory in Highland Park. it's a wonderful old building that has a ton of different plants in giant greenhouses and rooms. there are also quail running around and my favorite, the turtles. i sat in the 80 degree room for a few hours sketching my non-moving cold blooded friends. i attempted to capture the progression of my work with some snapshots along the way. while my first painting was drying, i attempted another sketch in my toned book and was very pleased with the results. 

[watercolors, watecolor pencils, pilot falcon w/noodler's black eel ink all in a stillman & born sketchbook]

[pilot falcon w/noodler's black eel ink, pitt warm gray markers in a toned strathmore sketchbook]

wed. night painting

i was uber-excited to get to my wednesday night painting class. i got all setup, all ready to go, and i ad no idea what to paint. another student had the idea to paint this still life. a cliched wine bottle, carafe, and some grapes. i wasn't feeling it and neither was my instructor. so i wiped it down and started again. i am still unhappy with the results and i think the MDF panel is going to meet mr. turpentine and mr. sander next week. 

gelli plates!

oh man are these cool! i bought some gelli plates for my students to use in the printmaking station. but of course, i had to try them out first! if you are unfamiliar they are a reusable monoprint plate. but the plate is made out of a thick silicone gel. you can layer, and layer and mask, and draw and layer, and keep printing. they are amazing! 

these are some of the initial results:

mall sketching

i got to meet up with my favorite local sketcher genine--or as google wants to autocorrect her name to--genuine. we sat at my not-so-favortie coffee shop and sketched the robots waiting for the name to be called and to get their hands on a cup of overpriced, bad coffee. we then shuffled over to the food court for a snack and some more sketching. we ended the day sketching people in line for santa! 

at the end of the day i bumped into 5 students, 1 fellow teacher, the woman who cuts my hair, a local illustrator friend, and a partridge in a pear tree. 

[various pens, strathmore toned sketchbook]

xmas presents

here is a pic of the painting i made as my parents christmas present. i did a sketch a while back of the boathouses on canandaigua lake and my mother exclaimed "i want a painting of that for the spare room!". voila. 

you can also a hyper lapse video of me in action painting most of it.

[16"x40" canvas with acrylic paints and paint markers]

burgers and sketchbooks

my usual wednesday night painting class got cancelled due to a snow storm, so i grabbed a a burger, my sketchbook and sketched some unsuspecting models. 

[pilot V5 pen, white gel pen, PITT warm grays all in a Strathmore toned sketchbook]

wednesday night painting!

here is tonight's adventure. i was trying to capture the progression of the painting process. but i got too into the painting and forgot some other shots. oh well. there is always next week!

tools: [oil paint on board]