Perfetto
In Italian, perfect. I am grateful to share sketches and photos of an extraordinary week teaching Sketching the Fall Nature of Umbria with Winslow Arts Center. The weather, the setting, the accommodations and, most importantly, the workshop participants were, in a word, perfetto. I thought I’d write a longer post to share the experience with you. Feel free to skip the details and enjoy the images if you prefer. 1. Friday- My husband Dan and I fly nine hours to Rome the day before the workshop begins, arriving at 1:30am Eastern time/6:30am… Read More
Finished – Unfinished
I found this Jack-in-the- Pulpit at the edge of our woods a week ago but it didn’t make last week’s Fall Collection. With its bright red berries and arcing leaf, it deserved its own page. Still, its three faded leaflets paled in comparison with the fruit, so I decided to let the berries get the attention. Finished? Unfinished? I think finished, especially after the moth showed up on our porch ceiling and made its way onto the page. Tips and Techniques– Decision, decisions! Right from the start of every piece, you are… Read More
Fall Collection 2023
My desk is littered with signs of the changing season. It started with a walnut and an acorn and quickly turned into a full-on collection. I love recording these small treasures, though I’m happy to clean up and have my desk back, too. Tips and Techniques– What treasures are you seeing as the season changes? Take a walk or a hike and see how many tree nuts, seeds, and fruits you can find. What’s nice about sketching things like this is that they are easy to bring home and work with as… Read More
Left Behind
What a treasure to find the shell of a northern moon snail, a perfect whorl nearly four inches end to end, decorated with a few barnacles. I love the heft of it in my hand. I love turning it over and over to study it from different angles. The huge snail that built it is long gone, but how nice that this was left behind. Tips and Techniques– I did this page directly with a Micron 005 sepia pen and a light wash of sepia watercolor, plus a bit of yellow ochre… Read More
Vinalhaven Sketchbook 2023
Moss-carpeted forests, spruce spires reaching the sky.Mushrooms after rain: scarlet, orange, purple, yellow.Granite boulders that sprout gardens of ferns and grey-green lichens.Rocky pools brimming with life caught between the tides.Migrating shorebirds and seabirds.Quarry swimming. Quiet. No stop lights. No chain stores. No cell coverage.Ferries. Fog.These are the things that draw me to the island of Vinalhaven, Maine. I hope your summer has taken you to some of your favorite places, too. See other Vinalhaven Sketchbooks:2020 Map, 2020, 2021.
Painting Exuberance
If last week I praised precision, this week I extol the value of putting some exuberance on the page. Especially when it comes to sketching your favorite subjects, or new-found discoveries in nature or, even better, both—some loose pen and paint and a splash of spatter can help to bring energy to your page. I painted this as a demo for a recent class on mushrooms, a subject deserving of enthusiasm. I’ve since headed to Maine, where I stepped out of the car and found black trumpets and violet cortinarius mushrooms pushing… Read More
In Praise of Precision
It’s nearly mushroom season here in New York, the only time of year that I’m rooting for humidity and rain. I typically work fast to keep up with sketching the variety of mushrooms under our grove of oaks, but for now, I’m taking my time. There’s so much subtlety and beauty in the simple form of a mushroom. It’s a pleasure to look closely and capture it on paper. Tips and Techniques— I did this painting as a demo for my online Mushroom Explosion in Watercolor class using a photo I took… Read More
Eastern Phoebe
Nesting season is winding down for most songbirds, though more industrious species are still working on raising a second brood. By mid-summer the young of the year are active and you often see them flitting around testing their wings in the yard or perched together on telephone wires. Hopefully, the Eastern phoebes that were raised in this nest are among them. I took a photo of the nest back in May and finally had a chance to paint it with my class Bird, Nest, Eggs. Tips and Techniques– Bird nests are made… Read More
High in the Treetops
A flash of orange streaks across the yard. A fleeting glimpse, combined with a clear whistled song from high in the cottonwoods means only one thing: an oriole is here. The males sing to establish and defend their breeding territory and I can only hope that this will be it. Maybe his mate is already weaving a pendulous nest up there, hidden by foliage. Wouldn’t that be a treat? Tips and Techniques– Sometimes drawings come effortlessly. Many times they don’t. And sometimes it’s best to start over. Such was the case with… Read More
Noticing
Sometimes, painting is about the obvious things: the beauty that’s right in front of you, bold colors, compelling light, big picture views. But more often for me, it’s about the things you might pass by: the subtle, the small, the imperfect. Learning to notice is more important than pencil, paper, or paint. I had ample opportunities to sketch both bigger views and subtleties when in Maine recently. Which is more compelling to you?
Jean Mackay
The Nature Explorer’s Sketchbook
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Drawn In 