I was sketching different views of our kitchen, trying out various views for my series portraying the rooms in our home. Did I want one with the view looking out on the patio? Or maybe one focusing on the odds and ends on our kitchen table? The fruit on the counter? Nothing was really clicking with my imagination.
It was getting late and my husband was making goulash on the other side of the kitchen. And it came to me, that the view I like best is the one with him cooking.
A dining room table, by design, is a device that is all about good times. Dinners with family, birthday celebrations, holiday feasts, Friday night with friends, and game nights. It is the place where it all happens, except, of course, in times like these.
Fortunately, our table, which has served so many people over the years, also works perfectly as a table for two. There are more than enough chairs to go around. Clean up is a chinch, and we can pile it up with books. It is especially nice in the morning when the sun comes in from the east, which is how I painted it today.
Our model for the Fresno Tuesday night sketching group posed in a cream jacket with a white feather boutonnière. With his bare feet, he looked like a tired out partygoer, and I was eager to convey it all in a painting.
His jacket color reminded me that I had several sheets of paper that had been treated with golden watercolor grounds. Perfect, I thought, for capturing the color of his jacket and boutonnière, and I pulled a sheet out and got to work.
The drawing went well, but when I began to paint, I had trouble. The grounds give a texture to the paper that prevents the paint from mixing down into the surface as it normally does. The thinner paint beaded on the surface and dripped down the page until I took it off the easel and painted with it flat on my desk. In the end, I thought the colors appeared too bright, and I missed the eggshell mat finish of the gouache. I spent part of the following two days making adjustments to the sketch and feel like I learned a bit. I like the final painting, but not enough to use golden grounds again soon.
I was Zooming with some friends and kept noticing one particular person and her eyes. I think her dark sweater, the dark chair that encased her, her slim face, her position at a slight angle to her camera, and the odd distortions of my computer monitor all combined to highlight her gorgeous eyes.
Two posts ago, I showed the sunny side of our family room. Today’s sketch shows the nook on the other side that leads to the stairs going up to the living room. When I worked, this was my desk for keeping up with my professional work. Now this is my studio. We added quite a bit of shelving and an additional table over the five years of my retirement, so this area changes along with my interests.
This painting was more challenging than the previous one from this series. I wanted to show how cozy this side of the room is, but it is full of materials and paintings. I ended up showing more clutter than comfort. And I need more practice with the way artificial light falls on the walls and floor. Perhaps at the end of this series, I will come back to this part of our home and try again.
Our Tuesday evening Zoom model somehow managed to sit perfectly still while watching TV in her living room. She had an air of attentiveness that showed in her eyes, and I worked to capture that in this sketch.
I started a new series today, painting the rooms of our home.
Of course, I had to begin with this room, our family room. Of all the rooms, this one brings out my sentimental side. When we were looking for homes in 1989, this room decided it all for me. Our children were small, and the thought of a space where they could freely enjoy their train tracks, dollhouses, games, books, art materials, and Lego pieces thrilled me. We put my desk in a corner, and their toys just about everywhere else. My husband’s study is in an adjoining space. We graded papers, played games, and life was good.
Over the years, the family room’s design shifted along with our interests and hobbies. The toys are gone. The room is full of art, including carvings from my father and watercolors from my mother. These days I sit at the old game table and read or watch the birds poking around in our patio garden.
I wanted to show you what this room feels like in the morning. I think you can see how the sun pours in through the French doors, across the game table, and accentuates the colors of the floor and wood. And I think you can imagine me standing at my easel across the room, trying to capture it all for you.
Deliberate Sketching 