Category: Sketching

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Painting and Drawing the Same Subject

Painting and Drawing the Same Subject

Garlic Study – Pencil

If you’ve noticed my body of work over the past year or so, you’ll notice that much of my work is of the same subject or subjects. Perhaps you ask yourself why Keith concentrates on one or another subject rather than trying new things…well, that’s what this article is about.

They say “imitation is the sincerest form of flattery” and in some ways we artists are, in fact, trying to imitate what we see made either by the hand of God or the hand of man. Artists take what we see, process that image through the filter of our lifetime experience, then attempt to imitate what we see in our mind’s eye. Continue reading “Painting and Drawing the Same Subject”

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Of Pen & Ink

Pink Crape Myrtle

I like to experiment with different techniques of pen & ink. Recently I bought a dip pen with several nibs and went to work on a couple of botanical studies.

On the Pink Crape Myrtle painting to the left I penciled in the overall outline before going to the pen & ink. Usually when I’m using a fountain pen I tend to just draw out the sketch without first penciling in the outlines.  Freely inking the sketch forces me to concentrate more as I draw my subject. Continue reading “Of Pen & Ink”

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Quantity-Quality-Or Both

Photo and work in progress

Is quantity, quality, or is both that are important when it comes to learning to paint with watercolor or sketch with pen & ink?

Learning a craft is much like playing a sport—to get good at it, one must practice, practice, and practice some more. Sports legends like Michael Jordan, Tom Brady, and Tiger Woods spent hours, days, and years practicing their sport to get to the level they have all achieved. Continue reading “Quantity-Quality-Or Both”

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Urban Sketching

Carol Hicks Bolton Antiques in FBG

In the course of improving my drawing skills and learning watercolor I ran across the group: Urban Sketchers a global community of “urban sketchers” started by Gabriel Campanario, a journalist and illustrator in the Seattle area.

I think it was Teoh Yi Chie at ParkaBlogs.com that introduced me to the urban sketcher concept. Continue reading “Urban Sketching”

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Artists Journal

Happy Flag Day!

One of the reasons I decided to get serious about painting and drawing was I saw it as a way to keep track of our journey as retirees. I’m not really sure where I  got the idea of drawing/painting as we traveled but it’s certainly turned into quite a habit.

What I do know is on January 5th of 2018 I started my first sketch book and in December of the same year I drew my last sketch in that book. I know that in the beginning I used pencil but by the end I was mostly doing pen and ink. In fact, if you look closely at the picture above you can see the sketch on the other side of the page showing through…the sketchbook was designed for pencil, not pen and ink…oh well. Continue reading “Artists Journal”