Currently Browsing: Why Draw? 168 articles
Sketching on Any Old Paper You Have At Hand
Sometimes we can get into our heads. We can spend time telling ourselves all the reasons we can’t take time right now and paint. As a teacher for over 30 years I think I’ve heard every excuse there is: no space to set up, don’t have the materials I want to work with; I don’t […]
In Context—Sketching Through Pain
Be sure to note the date—it’s last April! I’m doing just fine today and keeping up with all my physical therapy maintenance exercises. This is a couple sketches of Nic Sampson, an actor on “The Brokenwood Mysteries.” Click on this link to read my recent review of the series. (Hint, I’m a fan.) I […]
Snow Pile By Any Means Necessary
The weather is turning warm again, getting back into the 20s (Fahrenheit). I’ve been able to sketch a couple snow piles this winter, but I think it wasn’t until almost the end of December that I got one! Before the weather gets too warm and we want to think only of other things, I thought […]
The Journal as Workbook
Below is a video which explains my view of the journal, and how I use my journal in my daily practice. Students in my “Drawing Practice: Drawing Live Subjects in Public” class asked me to share it publicly when I shut down my on-line teaching platform at the end of last year. They wanted to […]
Journal Practice Hiccups?
I always tell people any day is a great day to start a journal practice. Start. But I know that many people think it important to have a milestone day like the first of the year for a starting point. If it gets them to start then I’m all for that. As a new […]
Getting Something Down on the Page
This is a sketch from 2020. I was four months out from the second cataract surgery and I think I’d already had one secondary operation to zap some cloudiness. (But it didn’t resolve any of the double vision issues.) I was frustrated early one morning, unable to sleep. I scribbled. It felt great to get […]
Missing the Fair
I’m still feeling waves of Fair deprivation. Happily while I can’t go to a fair yet, Earth of Earth’s World has been going to fairs. I asked, and Earth is happy for artists to sketch from the photos up on the website if you give attribution. #Earthsworld if you’re on Instagram. Here’s a sketch I […]
Pen and Watercolor Portrait Video Demonstration
Below is the edited version of a live stream demonstration I did publicly several weeks ago. I’m posting it here on my blog because some readers may have missed it when I did it live in Facebook on my RozStendahl feed. It is no longer available there. I took it down so that […]
In Context—Playing Catch Up
I’ve been offline for five days and it seems like I’ve forgotten everything about the computer and the programs I work in. I’m playing catch-up and a post here was on the top of the list. It has been a difficult month physically for me: increased vision difficulties and a back spasm that made […]
In Context: Small Details Matter
In this brush pen and watercolor sketch in a Hahnemühle Travel Journal I’m working with wet media on a drawing paper and loving it. (I’ll have a counter opinion about using non-watercolor paper coming up another day on the blog.) You can click on the image and read the in-context text, me cooling my heals, […]