Apple-Pine: sketching

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Dear friend of the family: Sergej Ivanovich Shatskiy

Two days ago we lost a dear family friend - Serezha Shatskiy - he was a friend of my parents for over 50 years, he knew my grandparents, saw my brothers and me grow up. He supported us, challenged us, teased us, fought with us, worked with us, taught us. He was a part of our large family.

Always late to any gathering but always present at all the family celebrations, reunions, funerals, and just evening teas. Serezha was the one who was visiting my parents during the first days of the war with a tub of ice cream - it was the last thing left in the stores by then. But with his endless sense of humor, often dark, and often not politically correct, he reframed it: war or not war but girls deserve ice cream.

His apartment got damaged during the shelling of Kharkiv three times, yet he stayed in his cave of wonders filled with layers upon layers of musical instruments, equipment for repairing them, and antiques of all sorts. He stayed there until it was no longer possible to live like that. And as if that connection was what was keeping him alive, he expired just a few days after evacuation from Kharkiv.

Many people knew Serezha as a musical master who repaired and improved an endless number of all sorts of musical instruments. I know many guitars that went through his hands and many people who are very grateful. He was a multi-talented person with an endless fascination with the world and the ability to support curiosity in himself and others. When I wanted to learn more about the cello and how much Mstislav Rostropovich changed the world of this musical instrument, Serezha combined a huge collection of cello pieces for me to listen to. He was usually working during the night and boasted that he strived to be the first one to put a "like" on my art posts from across the world.

He is survived by family and friends dispersed all over the world and he will be dearly missed.

I last saw him in person when I visited my parents in 2021 - he greeted me with his decades-old greeting "здравствуй, Ниночка, что не день то картиночка".

Here is a sketch from that meeting, and below it, you will see a gift that I got from Serezha on that day - an antique pochade box that he restored for me. I asked my Dad and Serezha to make me a portable/lap easel for painting on location. When I was giving him my "requirements" he replied with the image at the very end of this post - commenting that he thinks that the bottom left corner contains just the right box as per my description - this was a typical дядя Сережа :)

Youtube tricks

I use a "save" feature on youtube a lot - I keep playlists on many topics and not only go back to re-watch videos that I found useful but also just try to have a list of "to watch" and put new videos there to avoid binge-watching things when I am procrastinating - I add them there and watch later - during the special "youtube time" (things we do to trick ourselves! :)

As I recently realized you cannot save videos that are marked that they were "made for kids". And I kept all my videos marked as "made for kids" - as I thought that watching as someone draws or flips through a sketchbook is an OK activity for kids :) But now I corrected this - and you can save the videos to your lists.

Here is the one I uploaded today to test:

Radishes and experiments during the quarantine

I've been experimenting with different food-related things lately. Ways to get food, ways to make food, ways to combine different foods and ways to sketch food.
Here is a story of a bunch of rainbow radishes through two days, my new sketchbook and gouache.

I asked people on social media which background they prefer and it was very interesting to read replies!

Sketching disasters (or not so much)

Last week was filled with sketching disasters - which turned out to be not so much of disasters as experiments :)

On the first day, I forgot my tube of white gouache. But I sketched a pink tree and some single flowers too.

On the second day, I forgot my palette with actual paints and had only my mixing surface with me - on which I had some leftover paint mixes (quite a bit as I found out). I sketch another plum tree in bloom.

On the third day, I went running with my pocket gouache kit (dry gouache set, pen, red and blue pencil, and waterbrush) and found out that my waterbrush is empty (it was wet enough for one change of color basically) and then my pen ran out of ink.

On the fourth day, I forgot that the new ink in the pen is water-soluble! And I had only a mini watercolor kit (no gouache to fix mistakes!). So I looked at a clear, colorful sunset I produced a dirty gray sketch.

Making Paper Cut Sketches is a Lot of Fun - Try It!

I regularly draw at kid's activities - and often these are really good, intense life drawing classes. But doing that several times a week for several years gets to you and you start thinking up new ways to practice - so I've picked up some color paper and scissors and now challenge myself to make a paper cut-outs of the movements and poses.

I made a folder with all of the sketches done with scissors: https://www.flickr.com/photos/23173190@N07/sets/72157688760574933
A couple of technical notes:

1. Scissors. I love victorinox knives but the scissors were killing my fingers after one class - so I got small scissors from my sewing kit (these actually have rounded tips - I want to try some sharp scissors too soon.

2. Using smaller pieces of color paper was a great idea as I often have to rotate the paper and even fold and move it quickly to catch the shape of the movement and dealing with the large paper was just ugly (and wasteful).

3. Carrying ziplock bag for all the tiny pieces of paper that are leftover saved me from extra cleaning after the class.

4. Having a glue stick and some extra pieces of paper with me gave me a chance to compose some of the pages right on the spot and it felt more like a complex scene made right there rather than a bunch of quick gesture sketches.

I want to try:

1. Some unusual scissors

2. Exacto knife

3. Making more compositions with the holes (negative space) left after I cut out a figure

4. Making multi-part pieces (I tried it with the cello and it did not work well but I think it's worth experimenting.

Workshop Announcement: Island Adventure!

Imagine yourself on an island-hopping sketching and journaling adventure in the Channel Islands National Park off the California coastline. Very few people ever see these places and you will go there with a naturalist and three sketching enthusiast (Suhita Shirodkar, Gay Kraeger and myself) to inspire and support your creative journey.

Three days and nights of drawing and painting, hiking, kayaking, snorkeling and cruising on and around the amazing Channel Islands. Have a non-sketching companion? They can join too (with a discount). Find out more at:
http://watercolorjournaling.com/channel_2019_page1.htm

Hope to see you there!

Sketchbook #116: Annual Catching Up Post :)

I am slowly trying to catch up on my scanning and posting - which - I now realize - is something I do every year around this time :) Something about spring becoming summer slows my scanning and posting motivation (I draw about the same amount) and just in a few short months, I am over two sketchbooks behind. In addition to that, I work on various projects outside of my sketchbook and things get tangled and complicated because of that too. So I start asking myself why I post and who cares and all that self-talk. In the end, I try to remember that this blog is my vehicle at tracking how much I grow and change and it allows me to look at my work and not be discouraged by daily failures but to keep an eye on a general curve. So once again I am going to catch up my posts to my actual painting and I have a new strategy to try to do so and I have a new strategy to keep myself on track next time - let's see if it works :)

Trip to Bonaire - Kayaking in Mangrove Forest

I got a captain's sit in a double kayak this time and had an apprentice to do the rowing for a while to draw. And then just stopped to do several views from the same shady spot in the middle of mangrove maze.
That PowerTank ballpoint pen from uni was amazing! (see photo of the process below). It worked on my completely wet, salty paper like a brush! I loved it so much that I even tried to take it with me scuba diving - but at 70 feet it refused to pump ink :( too bad - it would have been a great tool! But it survived the submersion and depth and my vigorous attempts to use it and still works fine on the surface.

Urban Sketching Workshops Around the World and in the Bay Area - I am teaching on April 22nd!

This is an exciting year for Urban Sketching! Urban Sketchers is 10 years old this year and they’re celebrating with year-long workshops all over the world. Excited? Click this link to see where all the workshops around the world are. Each city lets you pick from 10 workshops being held throughout the year.

Workshops in the San Francisco Bay Area

The San Francisco Bay Area chapter of Urban sketchers is excited to be holding it’s own series of 10 workshops all over the Bay Area: 10 teachers you’ve been wanting to take a workshop with, and workshops geared towards all levels of sketchers! To read more about those workshops, go to this link. If you’re interested in a Bay Area workshop, get in touch with Suhita at suhita@gmail.com and tell her what classes you’re interested in. She’ll walk you through the registration process.

I will be teaching a workshop titled
"Creating collections of everyday moments" in Los Altos on April 22nd.

Level of difficulty: Beginner, Intermediate, Advanced.

Strategies we will work on:

finding time even in hopeless situations
being quick and ready to start at the moment’s notice
unifying drawings on a page
appreciating both subtle changes and consistency in the collection we create together.

To register for any of the Bay Area workshops, contact suhita@gmail.com and put “San Francisco Bay Area 10×10” in the subject line of your email. Let her know what workshops you want to sign up for. Suhita will let you know if there are still spots open and she will help you through the registration process.