Currently Browsing: The Drawing Life 162 articles
Self-Assessment: 2018—Filling Journals, Using Up Paint
Some Background and The Brand of Paint I’ve Been Using Lately Yes, this painting actually has something to do with self-assessment and goal setting. First I want to say something about the materials… While I did sketch some more after painting this image yesterday (Dec. 31, 2018) this turned out to be my final […]
Happy New Year 2019
It’s the first day of the New Year! I believe that everyday needs to be greeted as a first day. I believe that you need to do something creative each day. In the 10 plus years I’ve been writing the blog I’ve written about New Year’s Day each year. Here are links to some of […]
Roz’s 2018 Minnesota State Fair Journal
Today’s gallery contains all the pages of my 2018 Minnesota State Fair Journal. This year I was able to attend on three days. There are sections indicating the start of each new day, and stating which day was the sketch out (I could only attend one of the sketch out days). I worked on 300 […]
Focusing on Doing and Not on Naming
Several people wrote to me after my last post When Drawing Isn’t Fun. Most said that they found it helpful in starting an internal dialog with themselves about their creative practice. But one of my Urban Sketcher friends Tina Koyama wrote a very important point in her comment on that post: Grief. The grief of letting […]
When Drawing Isn’t Fun
Recently a student wrote to my Drawing Practice group that she wasn’t sketching daily and wasn’t having fun when she did draw. Despite the fact that what she was drawing looked great and showed that all her hard work was paying off, she couldn’t see the value in it. This can happen to anyone at […]
Studying Other Artists, Or Dealing with a Plateau in Artistic Development
Recently one of my Drawing Practice students mentioned that she’d been discouraged to see the “before” and “after” artwork someone had posted on Facebook. Some of the artists included showed art from childhood and adulthood. Others posted work that was only a couple of years apart, yet showed great development of representational facility. All were […]
In Context: Traveling
Wonder how much of a Paul Rudd fan I am? I keep this lip sync battle on my desktop. I recommend you blow it up full screen and watch it any time you’re tired, waiting on hold, pissed off at a client, stumped by InDesign’s bizarre (compared to Quark’s) tools and tricks, or just need […]
Check Out My Article in Artists Magazine January/February 2019
A couple months ago I was asked to write a piece about sketching in the snow for Artists Magazine. (That link takes you to their subscription and individual issue purchase page. I’m in the January/February 2019 issue.) My copies arrived a couple days ago. The issue includes my 4-page article with 9 helpful tips on sketching […]
Why Drawing Matters
Drawing matters for a number of reasons. Last week I had a note from a past student who had recently lost her mother. The student had stopped drawing for months. Grief disrupts life in a thousand ways. When I was writing to her I was thinking about my own maternal loss this year, the death […]
Packing for a Trip or Class
Recently a blog reader who is going to SketchKon (see the note later in this post) wrote to me and asked for tips on packing for such a trip. She wanted to know which supplies to bring and what the perfect pack for carrying supplies might be. Very simply keep the following in mind: • […]