Favorites From February 2016 Sketchbook

Favorites From January/February 2016 Sketchbook

Delving in to the Sosltice: sketches about the dark

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 During these short dark days every moment of sunlight is a miracle. The rising and setting of the sun become major events for me as they were for my distant ancestors across the seas of thousands of years.  Yet, despite the fascination with the precious little sunlight we get here in the northern hemisphere this time of year it is the ever encroaching darkness that really takes center stage in my mind and imagination.

Dark shades of blue, purple, black and brown dominate my sketches.  The light (always impossible to really capture) is symbolically portrayed through the hot fiery colors of the sunrise and sunset,  Inevitably metallic gold and glitter gel pens, as well a bronze, white and silver pens make their appearance in my sketchbooks at this time of year,

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Another thing I do this time of year is work more and more with  water soluble ink in my pens. When watercolors are added the ink flows and mixes into the colors deepening them and harmonizing them in a dark, inky sort of way. Knowing that my ink line will bleed and run if touched with water also makes me leave more bits of sparkling white paper as I endeavor to keep lines intact in certain parts of the sketch. These sprinkles of white add to the contrast in the sketch and make the dark seem even darker.

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A dusting of snow gave me an opportunity to leave a lot of white paper and very quickly create a bold, wintry scene on solstice day.

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By late in the day all the snow was gone and we were back to deep earthy colors made even more vibrant and rich because everything was wet from the recently melted snow.

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One more way to capture the season is to create an art journal page. not a sketch, but rather a mixed media piece of art that is contained on a page in my sketchbook.

So many wonderful ways to create and record what we see, and experience everyday. Each sketch is a small celebration of all the good things that surround me each and every day.

Solstice Sun and Weather Sketches

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One of the things that continually fascinates me is capturing seasonal and weather phenomena. We've entered into the darkest of days of winter, making sunrise and sunset particularly noteworthy for me.
I miss the bright, sun-filled, extended days of summer, but also seem to have a fascination with the calm silence of the dark.

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The very rapid times of sunrise and sunset during this time of year present me with a challenge I can never resist: capture the color, mood and look of the sun rising and setting behind a tracery of bare tree branches. That scene never gets old for me and I look forward to exploring it through sketching every year.

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A good pen and a lot of cross hatching can sometimes be the right method. Other times I use a pen with water soluble ink so the inky blackness mixes freely with the watercolors. Different weather conditions will also cause me to pull out different media s I pursue capturing the scene, (which by the way is generally out one of the windows of my house). Same scene over and over, different weather and light both keeps things interesting and forces me to see the scene, edit and re-compose with freshness each time.

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I guess trying to capture the rising and setting of the sun and finding the beauty in the somber colors of the natural world at this time of year is my way of coping with the ever growing gloom which can really creep into my soul and make this a difficult time for me.  From time immemorial our ancestors have marked the passing of the seasons and sought to capture the solstice-tide sun at places like New Grange, Glastonbury and Stonehenge to name but a few. (click the links for video clips)

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Weather in any season is something I like to sketch too. Yesterday a rainy and wind filled nor'easter blew through giving me an opportunity to explore sketching the look of bare, wet trees bent in the gales.

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This morning there was no discernible sunrise as heavy cloudy hung low in the sky, remnants of yesterday's storm.  Cold, damp mist was clinging to trees and swirling around rocks.  I added oil based pencil in sanguine and black to my watercolors and pen sketch and also used some white paint to soften edges and create that feel of water droplets hanging in the air.

I'm looking forward to continuing this series of winter sunrise and sunset sketches along with any crazy winter weather we get.