There’s a lot of unplanned time during the holidays at our house. Some cooking and baking is involved. Too many Christmas movies are watched. And then there is the puzzle making. We avoid shopping due to the crowds and so we don’t get out very much.
This leaves me with an itch in my pen and I have to scratch it. So I doodle a lot. I may draw something in front of me or I may draw from photos or even sketches done by others. Normally I wouldn’t show these to anyone, mostly because they’re not worth showing. But I always feel that we do a disservice by presenting only those sketches we deem as “acceptable” and so I offer this pile of doodles, done on a whim during the holidays. All are small. All were done quickly. All represent very little at all. But they helped me scratch my itch.
Jodie and I sat down in the kitchen to draw one morning. She was drawing flowers from one of my botanical art books and I grabbed an orange and lemon, dropped them on a plate and did this rather poor rendition that I title “Orange and Lemon.”
I did go down to our Grande Marché one afternoon, sat for a few minutes and scrawled this sketch of one of the kiosks. Like most of my quick sketches, it illustrates the frantic pace at which is was done. But, like all sketches, it was fun.
One afternoon, Jodie and Chantal decided to make a fancy cake. I think they felt challenged by the two batches of cookies and bread I’d baked (grin). As I sat watching I started sketching the kitchen. This is as far as I got.
I met my buddy Yvan at the market for a bit of sketching people. The people movement was hectic but I did a couple pages like this. I’ve said before that I’m not a fan of people sketching but this is the only reliable sketching target for us in the winter.
One morning I just started sketching an old-time imaginary church on a hill. It was fun to just doodle some sparse scenery around it.
A quick sketch from a photo. Not much to say about it.
I’ll leave you with this. It’s a page of doodles I did one morning, mostly while looking at sketches done by my friend Yvan. I’d say I copied them but that wouldn’t do justice to Yvan’s sketches, which are in every way superior to these doodles.
I see people sketching leaves a lot. I’ve done a few but never been able to get the ‘rusty’ spots that leaves get as they degrade. I spend some time with this idea, trying varying amounts of water, working wet-on-wet. I’m out of my depth when I try wet-on-wet I’m afraid. This was my best result, which only says that the others were even worse (grin).
I won’t bore you with any more, mostly because I’m too lazy to scan them. I will say that these sessions were productive and I learned a little. Besides, sloshing paint and ink around is always fun.
