Karin Jurick Study

30x35cm, oil pastel on craft paper

Karin Jurick's blog is one of the strongest sources of my inspiration and learning.
It started when I found Different Strokes blog and it gave me courage and friends. Then I learned how talented and clever and active and sharing she is, so I became hooked to her blog completely.
Now Karin is in 100 portraits project and once in a while posted her "work in progress" for one of the portraits. I decided to repeat and the experience gave me a lot of joy and knowledge. Join!
Thank you, Karin.

My photo of the day is this toy from the exhibition of handmade things. Do child's traits left in you, or do you feel like a grown up? I am afraid that I'm losing the child in me and it makes me sorry.

Figure Drawing 2

My next two attempts to draw human figure. I am happy about the sepia boy and unhappy about the boat trippers, so the balance is kept. I downloaded these photos so long ago that can not trace the authors now. And very sorry about that. On the other hand my sketches have no commercial value, so maybe me is not such big criminal.

Georgia, November 2009

The photo of the day is the image of little Georgian village church. It was the foggy day in November 2009 when I took this picture. Great photo reference for painting, right? I can send you the high resolution image if you interested.

Figure Drawing

Watercolor, A5

The interest to subject of drawing changes during the route of learning. At the beginning I am puzzled how to draw clouds (not that I lost this interest, just get some basics and the sky drawing is not a hard challenge anymore), then trees, sea waves, how to draw rain? fog? buildings?
The theme of portraits and human figures drawing looks very far and very impossible. And then you realize that this theme is the most interesting and intriguing, that figures are shapes, faces are shadows and you need practice, practice, practice and some arrogance to show your scraps to the friends.

The boy above is based on photo, I did several attempts to catch the proportions right, but head is still a problem. The monsters on the right are my 30sec exercises from Posemaniacs.com (link). I highly recommend this site as the training source. And I promise not to post more monsters until they look rather appropriate)).

I was watching (at last!) the Oscar winner "Brokeback Mountain" while working on the upper sketch. You know what, it is just a love story, nothing more. I love you, you love me, but the life conditions are against our love. I saw thousands of such stories and several were much stronger and tense ("The Piano", "Maria's lovers", "In the mood for love"..). Oscar is ideological prize this time, I think.

New Challenge

Soft pastel, A3

I have not open my pastel box for a while. But when I saw the September image in Studio Atelier  (link) of Barb Benik, I realized the time did come.

I did not draw or paint for almost a ten days period. Lot of work which completely switched my mind off the creativity mode. I even did not want to start again, to take pen or brush. But the poison is already deep inside, I can not stop painting and drawing. I am back).

James Gourney is a talented painter and illustrator and dedicated blogger. Today he posted the link to the place where you could download free copies of Andrew Loomis excellent books-manuals about the art of painting, drawing, illustrating. Don't miss them!

How to draw a cello

In my Moscow blog I posted the photo-report about the concert I visited few days ago. Today I post here my drawing report.

They have started the first notes of Beethoven's concert for piano, violin and cello and I started my sketch. It was greatest pleasure to combine drawing and music listening. Color added at home.

I learned how to draw musician with cello, how to draw the bald head. The conductor was too active, was not about to sit to be drawn, so I offered him the static pose behind the piano.

And completely with no connection to the above text, I post the photo of these late summer flowers from parent's garden. Just because I like them.

Lemon in Oil pastel Dressing

I am back to challenges offered by the enthusiasts of art, I thank them so much!
This time it is Rookiepainter's 3 weeks challenge about the lemon and its slice.

I decided to do it in oil pastel and somehow on the way I added peaches, cherries, acid background, some solvent in shadows and the result turned out as real surprise for me. But this is my motto: enjoy the process first, result second. I do.

And thank you, Jen, for this opportunity to participate and to see the works of the talents on-line.

Aster

Every visit to my parent's place gives me inspiration to draw and paint flowers live, this time aster was the winner of the garden.

Look how the decay can be so beautiful, the vicinity of youth does not distract from the dying flower.

Roses

It was my intention to participate in "Inspiration All Around Us" painting challenge (link) in August and paint the beautiful roses of Dana Marie. And I did it, but in September. So I am late for the challenge but OK for my blog.

I did not know how to draw these little white sphere shaped flowers, do not know them in English (well, in Russian, too). They usually go with roses in bouquets. I used dry synthetic brush and methodically made these rounds on wet paper. It did not feel like the right painting action,  more like nail hammering)).

Now I have plans for next entry in September. Hopefully.

Krutitskoe Podvore

It is so right that many offices have lunch-break and are closed for an hour. If I was not late to visit my client's office and had to wait for it to open, I would not draw this 16th century beauty.
It was the interesting day, weather changing every 20 minutes. While I was sketching, I saw sun (so overcast, I could not make a photo), then strongest wind and swinging trees, then pouring rain started. And when cold and frosted I returned to my car, the sun returned back.

The story about the building was posted in Moscow daily blog (link is here).