Sketchbook Stuff

A while back, musing on ideas and searching for something to paint, I spent some time rummaging through old sketchbooks. It was an interesting journey through mediocre scribbles, a number of outright failures (too many), and a few worthwhile sketches.

"City Street," graphite, 4x5. 2014

Part of my new year plan has been to clear the detritus from my workspaces. Accordingly, during the most recent cold snap I've been shuffling stacks of papers and boards and sketchbooks, and once again have discovered a few sketches that might actually bear fruit. To my surprise one small 4x5 blank book from 2014 yielded more than any other. Some of these sketches have more finish than others of course, but even these small ones have enough information for use in painting larger versions.

"Diner Study," graphite, 4x5, 2014

One of my interests has been diners and the kind of interiors and characters you see there. Diners used to be ubiquitous. I can remember a diner in the tiny town of 400 in western Oklahoma where I spent my boyhood. Every big city had many such eateries. Today they're nearly gone, but for one reason and another I find them endlessly fascinating. The study here represents a musing about some larger paintings of that sort. I'm still musing.

"Celebrity," graphite, 4x6, 2015

 Mostly I use toned paper when drawing, often with a mid-value gray. Here's a small value study (about 4x6) in one of my other sketchbooks from 2015. In this case I think I was simply interested in how the light falls over the features and sunglasses. In all honesty until I was leafing through the sketchbook I had entirely forgotten this little drawing. The mid-value of the paper allows you to put in lighter lights and darker dark values to better emulate volume and mass. The woman is imaginary, though her heart-shaped face and elfin/pouty look could be any number of young female celebrities.

"Shoe study," graphite, 4x6, 2015

One final drawing, from the same sketchbook as the female study above, rose from an interest in realistic figures. The idea is to find as many different realistic poses as possible, sketch them in various places from life, from photos (online and print), and sometimes from other artworks (for example the Spinario). To that end many pages of my sketchbooks contain them. This particular one is probably based on an online image of a young man tying his shoe. The figure may show up in a street scene some day.