-
Recent Posts
- Garden photos and how to see even better June 20, 2021
- How clean are your glasses? May 28, 2021
- Goldilock’s Sketching Travel Kit May 23, 2021
- A time of gentle peace, with W. B. Yeats May 14, 2021
- An inspired podcast about “Why bother?” April 10, 2021
- A modern-day sacred scroll: Your CVS receipt! March 30, 2021
- “The chatter is what’s the matter . . .” March 7, 2021
- “Draw what drew ya.” February 28, 2021
- Never plagiarize: copy instead! February 21, 2021
- “You never know . . .” February 7, 2021
Categories
Tags
- architecture
- art supplies
- art tool kit
- Beginnings
- Being Present
- color mixing
- Community
- Creative Habit
- Creativity
- drawing
- drawing habit
- Eyesight
- fountain pen
- Freedom
- habit
- Habits
- Innate Health
- Inside-Out Understanding
- Inspiration
- Integrity
- kieep it simple
- learning from masters
- life-long learning
- Look at That!
- Looking
- mark-making
- meditation
- Memoir
- Mentors
- observation
- pen and ink
- pencil sketch
- Perseverance
- perseverence
- photography
- plein air
- practice
- reflection
- rule of thirds
- seeing
- seeing meditation
- self-publishing
- simplicity
- Sketchbook
- sketching
- sketching with others
- Three Principles
- tint brush
- urban sketching
- Watercolor
- Watercolor chemistry
- watercolor paint
- winter sketching
- wisdom
- Writing
- Writing Habit
Category Archives: Watercolor
How clean are your glasses?
I was prescribed eyeglasses when I was about 10 years old, and for me, wearing glasses is as normal as breathing. My poor mother had three kids who all wore glasses from a young age, and I recall her chiding … Continue reading
Goldilock’s Sketching Travel Kit
It has suddenly jumped from almost-too-cold to almost-too-hot to be sketching outdoors, which means there’s no time to waste in fine-tuning my art-supply travel kit. I say “travel,” but in truth for me, “travel” usually means leaving my third-floor loft … Continue reading
A time of gentle peace, with W. B. Yeats
“We can make our minds so like still water that beings gather about us . . . that they may see, it may be, their own images . . . and so live for a moment with a clearer, perhaps … Continue reading
An inspired podcast about “Why bother?”
You think you know someone, and then you listen to a podcast that launches your understanding to a brand-new level. I just finished listening to Episode 14 , “Making It Look Easy” with Liz Steel and host Nishant Jain on … Continue reading
Posted in Musings on Life, Pen & Ink, Urban Sketching (On-Site Creativity), Watercolor
Tagged Creative Habit, Inspiration, Mentors, Perseverance, seeing
4 Comments
A modern-day sacred scroll: Your CVS receipt!
The café tables are back on the patio at my favorite downtown haunt, and I’m once again luxuriating in a cup of coffee-someone-else-made as well as a uniquely New England hermit bar. My shoulder bag is loaded with all the … Continue reading
“The chatter is what’s the matter . . .”
Don’t you agree? The chatter in our head is often the only thing holding us back from happily giving sketching a try, or anything else for that matter. That sweet little brain of ours is trying so hard to keep … Continue reading
Never plagiarize: copy instead!
According to the dictionary, plagiarism is “the practice of taking someone else’s work or ideas and passing them off as one’s own.” We can all agree that plagiarism is a very bad idea; even if you don’t get caught, you’re … Continue reading
T, O, ST, G? What does it all mean?
A careful reader of my new book wrote to me this week with the following question: “I just bought Look At That! and the Winsor & Newton Cotman Sketcher Pocket Box you recommended. On the page where you talk about … Continue reading
Short and sweet is never a bad idea, for drawings or blog posts!
Good morning and Merry Christmas! If you’re finding you have a spare bit of time after the morning chaos is finished and while your Christmas dinner is cooking, here’s an idea. Think of an artist whose mark-making you really admire. … Continue reading
Posted in 3- Magic: Art Epiphanies, Pen & Ink, Watercolor
Tagged Creative Habit, learning from masters, Look at That!, mark-making
2 Comments
Braving the Cold with Patrick
Yesterday I had every intention of switching over to “online Sunday Sketching with Patrick” for the rest of the winter. I had sent him a text saying that since it was below freezing and there was a nice coating of … Continue reading
