Showing posts with label Books. Show all posts

Drawing Conversations About Time Management

I am a planning maniac and a time management freak - in recovery. I've been in recovery for quite some time, but it is an uneven road. For example, it means that this week I put on my weekly plans to forget about my plans :) I do try my best to let go of my attempts to have full control of my days, but I need my support group, so I read literature on the subject and listen to podcasts, too. This week, I even went further and went to an in-person event to meet an author whose books I recommend and gift often: Oliver Burkeman. Apart from several best-selling books Oliver Burkeman has a Newsletter too. His main message is deceptively simple: it is not humanly possible to do everything you want to do, and you have a very limited amount of time, so you need to choose what it is that you want to do and actually do it - today. I listened to the talk while drawing people around me. It was an hour well spent.

My Mind Map - Connecting Windows Into Different Lives (Hammershoi, Lucia Berlin, Bergman, Sydney Smith and more).

A few weeks ago, I shared some parts of my sketchbook where I dive into the world of books that I enjoyed recently and artworks that I am consuming by re-drawing them.

Some of the drawings and thought processes about connections did not make it to the previous post (Words and pictures about Vermeer, Hammershoi, Monet, Sydney Smith, windows, and refugee crisis). So I am adding them here - with the astonishing prose of Lucia Berlin and some stills from Bergman's movies that haunted me for weeks.

Here is a video of a flip-though all of these pages in my sketchbook:

Words and pictures about Vermeer, Hammershoi, Monet, Sydney Smith, windows, and refugee crisis.

As I am getting ready to part with the library books on Hammershøi, one more dive into redrawing of his windows brought up more connections and the interest to write them down. (Here is the first post about Hammershoi and another book connection).

Vermeer's light makes him one of my favorite painters, but his windows are not the main subject - they are a cornerstone of his works but there are too many other things to explore. With Hammershoi it is the elevation of the window beyond the source of light or framing device that makes me look again. The scarceness of other things and static, formulaic figures only make me look at the windows more and then just look more at everything. There is an essay that proposes homelessness as a concept for understanding Hammershoi and suggests that these paintings are a safe place for him. It helped me see that I think about his paintings as very long halts, icebergs of time. They make me think about winter feeling endless and about refugees, especially kids because of their different perceptions of time. About all the people who were torn away from their homes and whose life is suspended, people who are trying to find an anchor and human connection or at least calve that iceberg into something more manageable.

A few years ago there was an exhibition of Claude Monet's "The Early Years" and I saw it in San Francisco. One painting stuck with me since then - there is a girl with a red kerchief passing outside the window on a winter afternoon. We are looking from a room that already feels like dusk. The most interesting part for me is that I did not notice the girl during my first visit to the museum but wrote down quite a lot about the work itself. How many more times I didn't notice people?

My fascination with windows and multifarious associations needs another mention. There is an astonishing children's book illustrator whose name is Sydney Smith and in his book "Town is by the sea" (text by Joanne Schwartz) and I think that inherently this book is about windows. There are everywhere either by the presence of the light or lack of it and they are telling their own story. We see the world through them, without them, we see the world protected by them, we measure the passage of time by them. There is a lot of light in this book and a lot of darkness. But there is hope in between too, I think.

A window between two books.

Two books have made a deep furrow in my visual world lately. It took some time to register that, and now I am not sure if I started to take more time to look at things before I encountered these books, and that is the reason why they had such an impact or the other way around.

The first book was filled with words and had no images but what my mind conjured. I think if it had images I would be deprived of my experience with it. The second book is mostly visual but for me, it worked as an answer to the first one.

The first book is a series of essays about Japanese aesthetics In Praise of Shadows by the Japanese author and novelist Jun'ichirō Tanizaki. It talks about paper and toilets and writing instruments and theatre and how the path of a country is altered, how progress and cultural cross-pollination bring development and growth and also confusion, departure, and loss. And that all of these are inevitable, destructive and creative, and hard to accept yet are happening and therefore are already a part of life.

The second book is Hammershøi in Europe - it is a collection of paintings by a Dutch painter Vilhelm Hammershøi. I saw some works by Hammershoi in other books before but never noticed them or looked at them as I did after reading "In Praise of Shadows". There are studies, portraits, and landscapes and also glimpses at the shadows under the table, the light reflected in a lacquered cabinet sofa, a cup on the table, painting on the wall, roof shingles, and tree branches. And windows and doorframes and backs of the chairs and people.

These books for me are in a conversation about different ways to see light, about liminal spaces between the light and shadow, about very subtle feelings between places and periods of time, about a multitude of choices that were made and not made, and possibilities and delights of noticing. Perhaps it has something to do with my love for dust mites dancing in the sunbeams.

I've been re-drawing some Hammershoi paintings to discern them deeper.

Grateful: libraries

There are many things that are making life more complex these days and many things that are genuinely helping with that. It means a lot for me to look at things that are helping, so I wanted to pay them more attention and tell you about what helps me.

Here is one - my city library is working! (There will be a separate post about it as I want to draw some things for it - so not today). But in addition to my library, the system of the union of libraries works too! It means that I can order books from over 70 libraries around California and Nevada. For free. They will be shipped to my local library. And I can keep these books for 21 days with the possibility of renewing for another 21 days. Did I mention that it is free? I've been on a binge - hoarding bags and bags of books to look at pictures, learn new things, try new authors, read new poetry.

Here are some of the libraries that loaned me books this week:

Wisława Szymborska

I discovered Mary Oliver through the recommendation of a friend a few years ago and since then became a collector of little bits and larger pieces that I loved and many that I felt I did not grasp but with time they would open up for me and I will grow to understand them. Mary Oliver's passing last week plunged me down the rabbit hole of reading her poems again and one of the places where I got lost (in a good sense) was brainpickings.org
There I found a name of a new for me poet - Wisława Szymborska. She was a Polish poet, essayist, translator, and recipient of the 1996 Nobel Prize in Literature. She was alive in the wonderful sense of this word - and I think
I am sitting by a large pile of books I've already absorbed - many have both English and Polish texts side by side and I find it immensely pleasurable to read poetry like this. My Polish is almost non-existent - it's based on my Ukrainian origins, movies, songs and a couple of visits to Poland. But it's enough to touch a little bit that illusive another dimension of the language, feel how words are formed and how they sound.

Sketchbook #93: All kinds of People Around Me

Just finished reading "Can't We Talk about Something More Pleasant?: A Memoir" by Roz Chast - a great read, intimate, sincere, true and gentle. I laughed a lot because of so much truth in it.

My participation in a new book.

My sketches are in a new great book by Gabi Campanario:

The Urban Sketching Handbook: People and Motion: Tips and Techniques for Drawing on Location

My Sketches in a New Book by Gabi Campanario

Here is a link to the book if you want to learn more:
http://www.amazon.com/The-Urban-Sketching-Handbook-Techniques/dp/1592539629

November 14: Book Reading

I was invited to a wonderful book reading event this Friday.

The title of the book is "WHY IS THE MOON FOLLOWING ME?" by Emer Martin (Author), Suzana Tulac (Author), Magdalena Zuljevic (Illustrator).

It's an easily-rhymed, fun read for kids from 5 to 12, it's cleverly educational and filled with smart, whimsical illustrations!

As Emer did some reading and talking to kids, Magi drew mice with audience, I managed to sketch few scenes - below :)

You can learn more about this book at www.moonfollowing.com and order it on Amazon.

My interview for the "Artists' Journal Workshop" Book by Cathy Johnson

Interview # 14--Meet Nina Khashchina!

Hi all! This interview's been derailed a couple of times...both Nina and I have been busy, and she traveled in between there! Believe me, it was worth waiting for...

Let's jump right in and let Nina speak for herself!

-----------------

I started drawing very early and had a lot of support from my parents - until I stopped. I also kept a diary of sorts since I was a little child - but never consistently. There was a period in my life when I did not draw at all, I became a graphic designer and got completely computerized. Drawings were on little post-it notes, napkins, separate pieces of paper. And then the whole hand-made painting and drawing thing came back and I discovered a pleasure of keeping it all in one place - my sketch book.

Since summer 2005 I filled 57 journals - large and small, some I made myself (my favorite kind of
journal). Some I love for the paper, some for the cover. Some journals were filled in one breath, others took a long time, some became my friends as we went through life together, others I conquered with time :)

Another of Nina's wonderful sketches of her little boy in the park...

I draw in the park while my son unwinds after a day in preschool, while taking a breather when hiking, when chewing my lunch, while cooling down after the jog, in doctor's office, waiting in long line, waking up before everyone else does - the perfect time is right now :)

I seldom have time to finish things to the perfection or even correct mistakes but I enjoy the process – mistakes and all. This way I see time, I feel alive, feel the changes and notice beauty everywhere.
Drawing things helps me understand, slow down and see what's important for me and make choices. I think about sketching as a way of life. Way to travel. Way to think. Way to explain.

The purple ink makes a wonderful, colorful vibration in many of Nina's sketches.

It would be impossible for me to choose one medium as my favorite, mostly because they change a lot. Anything works if I NEED to draw, but I often have cravings for certain things to try. Just like with food - you can stop the hunger with ... WHATEVER but some food combinations work better with each other and a little variety always is an adventure ;) Right now I am a lot into a purple ball point pen and a diluted ink in Niji waterbrush plus some dip pen experiments.

Little watercolor set and brush pen are always in my backpack :)

I just came back from the Roatan island in Honduras. This trip came when I was in the middle of a power struggle with a sketchbook I liked at first sight and hated later. Store purchased 8.5 x 11 soft cover spiral bound book with some glossy paper. Surface very much like illustration board – smooth and slick. Pens and Markers were fine.

Paper was refusing color pencil after just two layers of application.
And working in watercolor was very frustrating since there was no chance for color to flow – only paint with brushstrokes and color was changing dramatically between the moment of application and when dry.

My first thought was to take different sketchbook but after some consideration I took this situation as a sign to try different things and it worked out great!

First – I decided to take more supplies with me than I usually do (the good thing is I can share it with my son – so it does not look like I took THAT much:)

Here are examples of what I usually take:

This time, I took a nice large palette of watercolors with a couple of real brushes, a tiny set with gouache with 2 waterbrushes, about 20 color and watercolor pencils and 10 Pitt color brush pens, plus my regular pens (purple ballpoint, Pentel Brush Pen, UniBall Vision Micro pen and Niji waterbrush filled with the diluted black ink). Plus tiny spray bottle, scotch tape and an old film container. This all fitted within a small first aid bag :) In retrospect I think I could have done without pencils and markers – but my son used them a lot – so I think this was the right choice!

Second thing I did to conquer this sketchbook was to take some small cold press 100 lb watercolor sheets, place them in an envelope on the back of the book and try to incorporate them whenever I could. This allowed me to work on several pages at once (humidity is very high on Roatan so there was a lot of waiting) and gave me a break when I wanted to enjoy real watercolor washes.

Third thing was that I had a little Moleskine Cahier book with me almost at all times – I was drawing at any opportune moment – while waiting for dinner, waiting for boat to load, sandcastle to be finished… This provided me with sketching time without interrupting activities of other company members. And every night I was tearing filled pages and posting them in my main book with some comments if needed. This way my tiny book was almost always empty and I was free to take it with me even when I knew it might get wet: I’d put one pen, gray waterbrush and my book in zip-lock bag and be ready for anything :)

Many of my pages are scanned and can be found here:

One of the projects I am working on continuously is a Badger Log.

Both the idea and inspiration came from my wonderful family and they support this log from the very first thought till today’s drawings.

Badger Log is about my interactions with a little badger I know, who happens to be related to me - how he is looking at the world and how I look at things because of him. I keep it as a sort-of a diary but only a few drawings so far made it to the scanner – so I am thinking about collecting a whole bunch together and making this log more public - how - I'll tell you later! :)

-----------------

Nina, thanks much for this wonderful, useful interview! Can't wait to see more of the badger's adventures--and yours!
-----------------
It seems I never posted this interview here - and now found this topic in an old "to do" list - so here you go - better late than never ;)

Book review: The art of field sketching

The Art of Field Sketching by Clare W. Leslie

My review

rating: 5 of 5 stars
I enjoy looking at how other people work with text and images in their sketchbooks, especially if it's a naturalist sketchbook. And this is a great collection of different pages by different artists dealing with nature as they see it every day. This book is very similar in the content to the "Keeping a Nature journal" and "Nature Journaling" by the same author though has more instructions if you are interested in techniques and starting points, it also talks a little more about sketching in the city, at home ans sketching as an ongoing part of your life.

View all my reviews.

At Last!

My book - "The Cat with No Name" is here - I received my first few copies they smell soooo good :) And it feels good too!

You will find more information and all 8 illustrations on my web-site:
Page 1 http://www.apple-pine.com/bk/bk_01.html
Page 2 http://www.apple-pine.com/bk/bk_02.html
Page 3 http://www.apple-pine.com/bk/bk_03.html
Page 4 http://www.apple-pine.com/bk/bk_04.html
Page 5 http://www.apple-pine.com/bk/bk_05.html
Page 6 http://www.apple-pine.com/bk/bk_06.html
Page 7 http://www.apple-pine.com/bk/bk_07.html
Page 8 http://www.apple-pine.com/bk/bk_08.html

E-mail me if you want a copy!